April 6, 1924 is not an anniversary most Azzurri fans choose to remember; and indeed one best forgotten after the Magical Magyars’ devastating display.
Hungary national team: the Magical Magyars (1924)
With four World Cups and one European championship to their name, Italy are undoubtedly one of the best national sides in the world.
Even though the Azzurri have endured some ignominious defeats in the past, none come close to the defeat to Hungary on April 6, 1924, in Budapest.
It was Italy’s biggest defeat in their history, which was in fact only a preparation game for the Olympic games later that year.
Italy national team: the Azzurri’s Olympic team (1924)
Forza Italian Football takes you through the build-up and the game, in the disastrous loss’ 91st anniversary.
Italy as a country was going through a relatively important stage in its history on the same day, with the radio already occupied with the parliamentary elections, meaning the game received little or no media attention. Everyone was talking about how the fascist party under whom Benito Mussolini won the elections by a landslide.
Benito Mussolini during the March of Rome (1922), when the Fascist party was gathering pace to win the election
If the unrest was in the streets however, it reached the national team as well.
Back then, Serie A involved two groups based in Northern Italy, with the top sides in each group facing one another in a two-legged play-off before eventually advancing to face the champions of the Southern part of the country for the Scudetto.
Unluckily for the FIGC, the top two Northern clubs at that time — Bologna and Genoa — refused to let their players leave for international duty, prompting Vittorio Pozzo who had a good relationship with the clubs, to interfere.
The Grifone only allowed captain Renzo De Vecchi to play the game, whilst Bologna’s excuse was that they an encounter against second placed Torino. Italy were depleted.
Genoa captain Renzo De Vecchi
To add insult to injury, Pozzo was without number one goalkeeper Giovanni De Pra; thus he was forced to field a certain Gianpiero Combi, who eventually went on to lift the 1934 World Cup as well as making over 300 appearances for Juventus.
Twenty-two years old at the time, Pozzo did not regard Combi as a genuine contender for the No.1 spot, and only fielded him because he promised to do so.
The Azzurri coach knew he had a depleted squad that was going to face a side considered to be one of the greatest in the world, a team that played with an ‘innovative’ formation by the name of ‘Danubian School’, which in fact eventually went on to be the basis of Pozzo’s Metodo system that won two successive World Cups in 1934 and 1938.
Italy coach Vittorio Pozzo held aloft after 2-1 win against Czechoslovakia in the 1934 World Cup final
It was a near impossible task against Hungary however, and that showed when the game kicked off in front of 40,00 spectators in Budapest.
Only 17 minutes in, Jozsef Braun — who tragically died in a Nazi labour camp in 1943 — opened the scoring for the Magyars, before doubling his tally with a penalty just before half time.
With the first half ending 2-0, the Magyars resumed their onslaught in the second period with Jozsef Eisenhoffer and Zoltan Opata’s strikes on either end of a Gyorgy Molnar hat-trick.
Italy did manage to pull one back with less than 15 minutes remaining when the then-Inter striker Luigi Cevenini converted a spot-kick; however the scoreline said it all.
The Azzurri were defeated 7-1.
Despite the embarrassing defeat, Italy did go on to have a decent Olympics in 1924 as they were knocked out of the quarter-finals. On the other hand, the Hungarians weren’t able to repeat their April 6 heroics, as they fell to Egypt 3-0 in the first round.
Hungary defeats Italy 7-1 on April 6, 1924
