Nowadays, many worship football as a sport of essentially democratic nature. The low cost of the materials used, the easy practice on any type of terrain and the simplicity of the rules are the central arguments of a sport that can be practiced by anyone. Seeing all these inclusive characteristics, many do not even imagine that this sport was once used as a propaganda vehicle for the fascist regime of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
At that time, Europe was agitated by the rise of totalitarian regimes in Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy. With an inflamed nationalist discourse based on a false premise of superiority, the leaders of these countries used sports competitions to feed the feeling of national unity among their citizens. In the Italian case, Mussolini ended up popularizing football at a time when cycling was the most prestigious sport among Italians.
By managing to host the 1934 World Cup, the fascist regime used stadiums as a major political arena for the celebration of Italian nationalism and its powerful “Duce”. Legend has it that Benito Mussolini would have carried out the miraculous mission of watching all the games in that cup. In fact, according to some historians, the Italian dictator achieved this false omnipresence by scattering several look-alikes who impersonated him at matches.
This type of juggling was not enough, the Italian dictator organized a series of tricks so that his team would become champion of the tournament. Legend has it that, in a rally that preceded the debut of the Italian national team, he would have discreetly threatened the players with death saying that the Italian participation would be something very good... mainly for the lives of your athletes! So that they didn't feel so pressured, the national team coach decided to carry out the team's concentration in Switzerland.
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In addition to these more direct actions, much is said about the bribery of referees and the carrying out of maneuvers that favored Italy's arrival at the world title that year. In the semifinals, for example, republican Spain faced Italian fascists in a match beset by grotesque mistakes. After tying the first game, the Spaniards ended up not resisting the second clash, which ended in one-0 for the Italians. It was after this that the Spanish team became known as “A Fúria”.
In the final of the tournament, played against Czechoslovakia, the figure of the imposing dictator had the support from 50,000 fans and the confessed political admiration of the Swedish Ivan Eklind, the arbiter of match. In that game, despite their superiority on the field, the Italians only guaranteed the victory in overtime, leaving the score in their favor with 2-1. At the end of the event, football and fascism ended up gaining prestige among the Italian population.
By Rainer Sousa
Master in History
Brazil School Team
world Cup - PE - Brazil School
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
SOUSA, Rainer Gonçalves. "Mussolini and the World Cup"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/educacao-fisica/mussolini-copa-mundo.htm. Accessed on June 27, 2021.
