Did a ‘Europe of Football’ Exist in the 1930s?

Abstract

ABSTRACTJust as the construction of Europe in the 1950s cannot be understood without reference to ‘Europeanist’ experiments in the inter-war years, the roots of a ‘Europe of football’ must be sought in the European football played in the 1920s and 1930s. Although UEFA did not yet exist, FIFA was initially a European organisation. Admittedly, FIFA voted in 1928 for the principle of organising a World Cup, and not a European Cup. A year earlier, the federations along the Danube had founded the earliest European footballing space with the creation of the Mitropa Cup and the International Cup. The Mitropa Cup, in particular, by the 1930s already had characteristics constituting the basis of a European football community, on the one hand, by trying to organise competitions from which football clubs make profit; on the other, by capitalising on the nationalistic feelings of spectators, thus running counter to the ambition of bringing the peoples of Europe together through football. Moreover, when a team representing Europe was brought together to face England in October 1938, it seemed to show off the continent's divisions. However, over and above the result (a 3–0 win for England), the initial foundations of a footballing Europe had been laid.