Reliving The Biggest Stage of Football: World Cup 1954

In the fifth episode of the series, we will look at the memorable World Cup 1954 in Switzerland from June 16 to July 4.

That World Cup was the first for West Germany, which they would eventually win.

Uruguay won the World Cup at their home turf in 1930, Italy won at their ground as well in 1934 and doubled their tally with another World Cup win in 1938 in France, and Uruguay entered the World Cup 1954 as the defending champion of World Cup 1950.

Korea Republic made their first World Cup appearance as well in 1950.

16 countries took part in the competition and were divided into four groups where the group winners and runner-ups would advance into the quarter-finals.

The late Miloš Milutinović of Yugoslavia scored the first goal of the tournament, which was also the only goal in the match that saw Yugoslavia edged France 1-0.

Brazil topped Group 1, with Yugoslavia finishing runner-up.

Hungary topped Group 2, with West Germany finishing runner-up. Hungary trashed West Germany 8-3 in one of their group games, Sándor Kocsis of Hungary found the net four times in that match.

Uruguay topped Group 3, with Austria finishing runner-up.

England progressed to the World Cup quarter-finals for the first time after winnin  Group 4. Switzerland came second in the group.

Hungary then defeated Brazil 4-2 in the quarter-finals and set up an encounter with two times World Cup winner Uruguay, who defeated England 4-2 in the quarter-finals.

West Germany beat Yugoslavia 2-0 and Austria edged Switzerland 7-5 in a twelve-goal thriller in their respective quarter-finals.

Hungary would then beat Uruguay 4-2 after extra time to send the defending champion back home. West Germany trashed Austria 6-1 in the simultaneous match.

The third placing match was won by Austria, after beating Uruguay 3-1.

The final in Wankdorf Stadium was attended by 60,000 fans. West Germany went 2-0 down just after eight minutes after goals from former Real Madrid player, Ferenc Puskás and former Barcelona player, Zoltán Czibor.

Max Marlock of Germany pulled one back for the Germans two minutes later as Helmut Rahn equalised in the 18th minute. Rohn then became the hero after scoring the winner in the 84th minute.

And so, West Germany became the third nation to win the prestigious tournament, after Uruguay and Italy.

Sándor Kocsis of Hungary became the top scorer of the tournament with 11 goals.

A new record of 140 goals were scored in World Cup 1950, from the 26 matches played.

The next World Cup in 1954 witnessed the brilliance of players like Pele, Vava, and Just Fontaine. Be sure to follow.