Football at the 1924 Summer Olympics

Football at the 1924 Summer Olympics
Tournament details
Host country	France
Dates	25 May – 9 June 1924
Teams	22 (from 4 confederations)
Venue(s)	4 (in 1 host city)
Final positions
Champions	Uruguay (1st title)
Runners-up	Switzerland
Third place	Sweden
Fourth place	Netherlands
Tournament statistics
Matches played	24
Goals scored	96 (4 per match)
Attendance	210,424 (8,768 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Pedro Petrone (6 goals)
	← 1920 1928 →

Last updated November 16, 2024

Football at the 1924 Summer Olympics was the sixth edition of the football tournament at the Summer Olympic Games held in Paris.

Venues

Paris		Seine-Saint-Denis
Colombes	Olympic Stadium Bergeyre Stadium Pershing Stadium Paris Stadium Locations in Paris	Paris
Olympic Stadium		Bergeyre Stadium
Capacity: 60,000		Capacity: 10,455

Pershing Stadium		Paris Stadium
Capacity: 8,110		Capacity: 5,145

Amateur status

In 1921, the Belgium Football Association first allowed for payments to players for time lost from work; in the months that followed four other Associations (Switzerland and Italy amongst them) permitted similar subsidies. The Football Association, perhaps with foresight, considered their statement of 1884 to be one which FIFA should hereafter follow. They had stated: "Any player registered with this Association ... receiving remuneration ... of any sort above ... necessary expenses actually paid, shall be considered to be a professional."^[4]

In 1923 the four British Associations sought an assurance that FIFA accept this definition; the four FIFA representatives on the International Football Association Board refused and, consequently, both the United Kingdom and Denmark withdrew their footballers from representing their nations at the 1924 Olympic Games.^[5]

Entries

In Association Football (1960), Bernard Joy wrote about the 1912 Games that the authorities in Sweden "had debated for a long time whether to include football ... because its popularity was not yet world wide". Twelve years later, in Paris, football had become so important to the Games that a 1/3 of the income generated came from football. In terms of international development these Games signalled the first participation in a major Championship of a team from South America, a continent which would provide the main competition to Europe from that moment on.

In Paris, Uruguay, who had paid their third class passage to Paris and gone on a successful tour of Spain beforehand,^[6] would join as many as 18 European teams; the United States, Turkey and Egypt.

The Uruguayans had won the 1923 Sudamericano by maximum points in the December of the previous year to qualify for the tournament as their continent's sole participants; defeating rivals Argentina 2–0 in the final game in which Pedro Petrone scored halfway through the first half. Joy wrote: "A doctor and a physical expert were as important elements of the staff as the coach himself. They saw to it that their charges reached perfect physical condition. They were kept that way by staying away from the attractions of Paris at a villa in the quiet village of Argenteuil". In Paris Jose Leandro Andrade would be dubbed La Merveille Noire.^[6] Despite this little was known about them; they had never played outside South America and their international experience had mainly been spent travelling across the harbour from Buenos Aires to Montevideo.^[7]

Italy, having remained unbeaten since 1922, found themselves beaten 4–0 by an early incantation of Hugo Meisl's Wunderteam (who would absent themselves from the Games).^[8] With just six weeks to go before the Games Italy had been walloped 7–1 by Hungary).^[9] Other than dropping Giampiero Combi, Vittorio Pozzo would not make major changes; Italy would not prevail.^[9] The same policy was adopted by Kingdom of SCS. Rather than considering dropping players, they had sacked their manager Veljko Ugrinić instead (following a 4–1 defeat by those Austrians in Zagreb) but would find his replacement Todor Sekulić just as hapless.^[10]

The Hungarians had just come off a good run of results in the previous year, but had been beaten by the Swiss in the days leading up to the Games; Max Abegglen, who had only been playing international football for two years, scoring his 7th international goal that day for the Swiss.^[11] The Swiss had been on the verge of withdrawing from the Games due to their continued success. The team's train ticket was valid for only 10 days and their money had run out. An appeal by a newspaper, Sport, brought in the needed funds.^[12]

Entering for the second time Egypt caused a surprise defeat in their opening game.^[13] Both finalists from the previous Games were present; Belgium being afforded a bye into the first round; the Czechs drawn against Turkey in the preliminary round.

Final tournament

The Games competition was assisted by a Preliminary Round which featured the silver-medallists from the 1920 Games, Spain in a game with Italy. Since that time Spain had only lost once and that by a single goal away to Belgium and had drawn 0–0 with the Italians in March 1924.^[14] There was hardly anything between themselves and Italy when they met, this time, at the Colombes Stadium; Pedro Vallana's own goal handing victory to Italy.

Hungary put five past Poland, the Swiss sent Lithuania on their way, 9–0. The Uruguayans played first-rate football, combining speed, skill and perfect ball-control. By marrying short passing to intelligent positional play, they made the ball do all the work, and so kept their opponents on the run wrote Joy. The Uruguayans sailed past Kingdom of SCS by seven clear goals, then overcame the United States by three goals to nil.

In the first round Czechoslovakia (following their decision to walk off the field in 1920) faced Switzerland and the game went into extra-time. One Czech was sent off, and the Norwegian referee had to call for order during a break. For the replay, Abegllen took the captain's duties and all was different; Switzerland winning by the single goal. Otherwise there were two surprises, the first went Egypt's way; 3–0 to the good against Hungary. The second saw Sweden defeat the reigning gold-medallists, Belgium 8–1. Oscar Verbeeck's own goal set the Swedes on their way; Sven Rydell's hat-trick the feature of the match. The Swedish outside-left Rudolf Kock (who would become chairman of the selectors in 1948 working alongside George Raynor), would have another fine game against Egypt where Sweden won 5–0. France and Holland had been similarly dominant in the first round, but Uruguay beat France 5–1 to claim a semi-final place.

In another quarter-final Italy went out to Switzerland disputing a winner by Max Abegglen, who converted a break-away goal. The Italians protested that he had been off-side. The referee Johannes Mutters, refused to alter the decision of his linesman; a jury upheld the judgement. There was further dispute in the semi-final where Holland (coached by the former Blackburn Rovers' player William Townley) took a first half lead against Uruguay through Feyenoord's Kees Pijl. With twenty minutes to go Pedro Cea scored an equaliser and with less than ten Georges Vallat, the French referee, awarded Uruguay a penalty. FIFA reported that "the Netherlands protested the ruling of a penalty kick that turned out to be the winning goal but then Uruguay protested against the Olympic Committee's selection of a Dutch referee for the final. To appease the South Americans, the committee pulled the name of a final referee out of a hat and picked out a Frenchman, Marcel Slawick".^[15] In the other semi-final between Switzerland and Sweden the Swiss prevailed.

In the final the Swiss were defeated by the Uruguayans whose two goals in the second half put paid to their opponent's ambitions, Uruguay eventually prevailing 3–0. Interest in the final had been considerable, such was the draw of the Uruguayan side; 60,000 watched and 10,000 were locked out.^[16]

Bracket

First round

Second round

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Final

26 May – Colombes

Uruguay

7

29 May – Paris

Yugoslavia

0

Uruguay

3

25 May – Vincennes

United States

0

United States

1

1 June – Colombes

Estonia

0

Uruguay

5

France

1

27 May – Saint-Ouen

France

7

Latvia

0

6 June – Colombes

Uruguay

2

Netherlands

1

27 May – Colombes

Netherlands

6

Romania

0

2 June – Saint-Ouen

Netherlands

2

Irish Free State

1

28 May – Colombes

Irish Free State

1

Bulgaria

0

9 June – Colombes

Uruguay

3

25 May – Vincennes

Switzerland

0

Switzerland

9

28 and 30 May – Paris

Lithuania

0

Switzerland (replay)

1 (1)

25 May – Paris

Czechoslovakia

1 (0)

Czechoslovakia

5

2 June – Paris

Turkey

2

Switzerland

2

25 May – Colombes

Italy

1

Italy

1

29 May – Vincennes

Spain

0

Italy

2

Luxembourg

0

5 June – Colombes

Switzerland

2

Sweden

1

Third place

29 May – Colombes

8 and 9 June – Colombes

Sweden

8

Sweden (replay)

1 (3)

Belgium

1

Netherlands

1 (1)

1 June – Vincennes

Sweden

5

Egypt

0

29 May – Saint-Ouen

Egypt

3

26 May – Paris

Hungary

0

Hungary

5

Poland

0

Match details

First round

25 May 1924

15:30

Italy	1–0	Spain
Vallana 84' (o.g.)	Report

Stade Olympique, Colombes

Attendance: 18,991

Referee: Marcel Slawik (FRA)

25 May 1924

15:30

Czechoslovakia	5–2	Turkey
Sloup 21' Sedláček 28', 37' Novák 64' Čapek 74'	Report	Refet 63', 82'

Stade Bergeyre, Paris

Attendance: 4,344

Referee: P. Chr. Andersen (NOR)

25 May 1924

15:30

Switzerland	9–0	Lithuania
Sturzenegger 2', 43', 68', 85' Dietrich 14' Abegglen 41', 50', 58' Ramseyer 63' (pen.)	Report

Stade Pershing, Vincennes

Attendance: 8,110

Referee: Antonio Scamoni (ITA)

25 May 1924

17:15

United States	1–0	Estonia
Straden 15' (pen.)	Report

Stade Pershing, Vincennes

Attendance: 8,110

Referee: Paul Putz (BEL)

26 May 1924

16:00

Uruguay	7–0	Kingdom of SCS
Vidal 20' Scarone 23' Cea 50', 80' Petrone 35', 61' Romano 58'	Report

Stade Olympique, Colombes

Attendance: 3,025

Referee: Georges Vallat (FRA)

26 May 1924

17:00

Hungary	5–0	Poland
Eisenhoffer 14' Hirzer 51', 58' Opata 70', 87'	Report

Stade Bergeyre, Paris

Attendance: 3,578

Referee: Johannes Mutters (NED)

Second round

27 May 1924