A soccer World Cup, whatever its result may have been, is an emotion that remains. And I've been through a lot of World Cup football. Naturally what remains in the end and comes back to you over the years is what happened to your team, to the Italian national team. And my beginning with the World Cup (June 1954) is the story of the bitter disappointment of an 8-year-old boy who, after listening to no less than three matches on the radio (the TV, at least where I was, hadn't arrived yet), sees his team thrown out, even a little unfairly.
Let's go in order. I was with my family in the countryside in a villa of my grandparents on the slopes of Vesuvius between Torre del Greco and Torre Annunziata. In Naples, it was said to be too hot for children. That day we had returned early from the sea on my father's instructions because there would have been the World Cup match on the radio. Italy was playing against Switzerland, the host team, but not the best from a footballing point of view. Our national team was coached by Czeizler, one of the many football wanderers from the Danube school and with a Swedish passport. He knew about football, but even then there was a lot of pressure around the national team and there was no shortage of rivalry between the players. Difficult locker room then. We had gone to Switzerland with two defensive blocs: Inter's with Ghezzi Vincenzi Magnini, Neri and Nesti, and Fiorentina's with Magnini, Cervato (the free-kick and penalty man) and Segato. The starting midfielder was the AC Milan player Tognon. Then a bit of Juve with Boniperti, captain, injured in the first match, Muccinelli and goalkeeper Viola. An Inter player also in attack: Benito Lorenzi known as Veleno.
And Lorenzi himself was the protagonist of the match against his will. Yes, because after Boniperti had equalized Fatton's initial Swiss advantage, Lorenzi had scored a goal that everyone, from Carosio who broadcast on the radio to all impartial and not impartial spectators, had seemed regular. But after an initial hesitation, the referee, the Brazilian Viana, who had been a guest of the Swiss football federation for the entire period of the Red Cross's retreat, canceled. It goes without saying that Lorenzi got himself expelled and that the controversies surrounding the Brazilian referee were no less than those that broke out years later against the "ineffable Mr. Aston" and the Mexican Moreno, considered guilty of having caused the defeat of our first by Chile and then by Korea. As you can see, we also come from afar in football.
Italy, defeated on their debut, made up for it in the following match, beating modest Belgium, but there was nothing to do in the subsequent play-off: again with Switzerland who sent us home with a peremptory 4 to 1. 'Italy the goal of the flag was made by the midfielder Nesti. And so my first world championship ended with many tears and not a little sadness. But as they say: in sport you have to learn to lose and I learned the lesson early. But I didn't like it.
For the rest, the 1954 World Cup was the one that Puskas' Hungary failed to win. The Hungarians clearly favored in the final against Germany went ahead 2-0. But then in the second half the Germans returned to the field transformed and won 3-2. after the final, 4 German players were hospitalised, complaining of stomach pains and extreme fatigue. In short, between accusations against the referees and suspicions of doping, even for football the whole world is a country.
The 8-year-old boy who from Torre del Greco relied on the voice of Niccolò Carosio to begin his career as a fan is now sixty years older. He still cheers for the national team and perhaps dreams that two of his countrymen (Immobile and Insigne, if and when they take the field) can give him a gift that will reward him for the tears of 1954.
