Football at the 1948 Summer Olympics

Football at the 1948 Summer Olympics

Tournament details
Host country	Great Britain
Dates	July 26-August 13
Teams	18 (from 5 confederations)
Venue(s)	13 (in 13 host cities)
Final positions
Champions	Sweden (1st title)
Runners-up	Yugoslavia
Third place	Denmark
Tournament statistics
Matches played	18
Goals scored	98 (5.44 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Gunnar Nordahl John Hansen (7 goals)
← 1936 1952 →

The 1948 Olympic Games title was won by Sweden, managed by Englishman George Raynor.

Summary

Sweden, whose Football Association forbade professionalism within domestic football, ran out as winners and only used 12 players throughout the entire tournament.

Squads

• Main article: Football at the 1948 Summer Olympics - Men's team squads

Final tournament

The final match ball

This began on 26 July 1948 with a preliminary round of two matches: Luxembourg defeating Afghanistan 6-0 and the Netherlands beating Ireland 3-1, with Faas Wilkes scoring two goals for the Dutch. In the first round, which began five days later, the Netherlands played Great Britain at Highbury, Britain prevailing 4-3 after extra time. In goal for Britain was Ronnie Simpson, who would go on to become the oldest Scottish international debutant in history and one of the Lisbon Lions.

Yugoslavia (victors over Luxembourg) and Sweden (3-0 winners against Austria) also went through. France did well to eliminate India, most of whose players ignored the need to wear boots.^{[citation needed]} Balaram Parab, the inside right, whose trade had been learnt in the Colaba area of South Mumbai, had done well against European touring teams; presented with a pair of boots: he stood out as one of the few that did.^{[citation needed]}

Sweden's play at White Hart Lane attracted much attention even then. Their forward line contained three exceptional players; one of them Gunnar Gren scored a brace in an easy win. There were two goals, as well, for future FIFA World Cup star Zeljko Cajkovski in Yugoslavia's 6-1 rout of Luxembourg, although they were behind at half-time. There were future World Cup stars also on parade in Korea's 5-3 defeat of Mexico and the United States's 9-0 defeat at the hands of Italy. Walter Bahr, Ed Souza, Charlie Colombo and John Souza would, later, find some sort of fame as members of the American team that would beat England at the 1950 FIFA World Cup.

In the quarter-finals, Sweden flourished against the Koreans and were similarly dominant against the Danes in the semi-final. Late in the game when Denmark were chasing an equaliser with the score 3-2 to Sweden, Gunnar Nordahl, who had strayed too far forward, raced into the Danish goal when the Swedes counter-attacked their opponent's goal, catching Henry Carlsson's winning goal before it reached the net. In the second semi-final Britain played Yugoslavia at Wembley Stadium going out by 3 goals to 1.

3-1 was also the score in the final, Gunnar Nordahl and Gunnar Gren's goals proving too much for the Yugoslavians.

Preliminary round

26 July 1948 18:00	Luxembourg	6–0	Afghanistan	Goldstone Ground, Brighton Referee: A.C. Williams (GBR) Attendance: 5.000
	Gales Schammel Kettel Paulus	Report

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26 July 1948 18:00	Netherlands	3–1	Republic of Ireland	Fratton Park, Portsmouth Referee: George Reader (GBR) Attendance: 8.000
	Wilkes  1'  74' Roosenburg  11'	Report	O'Kelly  52'

First round

31 July 1948 18:30	Yugoslavia	6–1	Luxembourg	Craven Cottage, Fulham Referee: Karel van der Meer (NED) Attendance: 7.000
	Stanković  57' Mihajlović  61' Željko Čajkovski  65'  70' Mitić  74' Bobek  87'	Report	Schammel  10'

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31 July 1948 18:30	Denmark	3–1 (a.e.t.)	Egypt	Selhurst Park, South Norwood Referee: Stanley Boardman (GBR) Attendance: 12.000
	K. Hansen  82'  95' Pløger  119' (p.k.)	Report	El Guindy  83'

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31 July 1948 18:30	Great Britain	4–3 (a.e.t.)	Netherlands	Arsenal Stadium, Highbury Referee: Vald Laursen (DEN) Attendance: 21.000
	McBain  22' Hardisty  58' Kelleher  77' McIlvenny  111'	Report	Appel  20'  63' Wilkes  81'

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31 July 1948 18:30	France	2–1	India	Lynn Road Stadium, Ilford Referee: Gunnar Dahlner (SWE) Attendance:17.000
	Courbin  30' Persillon  89'	Report	Raman  70'

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2 August 1948 18:30	Turkey	4–0	Republic of China	Green Pond Road, Walthamstow Referee: Johann Beck (AUT) Attendance: 3.000
	Kılıç  18'  61' Saygun  72' Küçükandonyadis  87'	Report

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2 August 1948 18:30	Sweden	3–0	Austria	White Hart Lane, Tottenham Referee: William Ling (GBR) Attendance: 9.514
	G. Nordahl  2'  10' Rosen  71'	Report

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2 August 1948 18:30	South Korea	5–3	Mexico	Champion Hill, Dulwich Referee: Leo Lemesic (YUG) Attendance: 6.500
	Choi Song-Gon  13' Bai Chon-Go  30' Chung Kook-Chin  63'  66' Chung Nam-Sik  87'	Report	Cárdenas  23' Figueroa  85' Ruiz  89'

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2 August 1948 18:30	Italy	9–0	United States	Griffin Park, Brentford Referee: Charles de la Salle (FRA) Attendance: 20.000
	Pernigo  2'  57'  88'  90' Stellin  25' (p.k.) Turconi  46' Cavigioli  72'  87' Caprile  90'	Report

Quarter-finals

5 August 1948 18:30	Yugoslavia	3–1	Turkey	Lynn Road Stadium, Ilford Referee: Victor Sdez (FRA) Attendance: 8.000
	Željko Čajkovski  21' Bobek  60' Wölfl  80'	Report	Gulesin  33'

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5 August 1948 18:30	Sweden	12–0	South Korea	Selhurst Park, South Norwood Referee: Giuseppe Carpani (ITA) Attendance: 7.110
	Liedholm  11'  62' G. Nordahl  25'  40'  78'  80' Gren  27' Carlsson  61'  64'  82' Rosén  72'  85'	Report

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5 August 1948 18:30	Great Britain	1–0	France	Craven Cottage, Fulham Referee: Karel van der Meer (NED) Attendance: 25.000
	Hardisty  29'	Report

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5 August 1948 18:30	Denmark	5–3	Italy	Arsenal Stadium, Highbury Referee: William Ling (GBR) Attendance: 25.000
	John Hansen  30'  53'  74'  82' Pløger  84'	Report	Cavigioli  49' Caprile  67' Pernigo  81'

Semi-finals

10 August 1948 18:30	Sweden	4–2	Denmark	Empire Stadium, Wembley Referee: Stanley Boardman (GBR) Attendance: 20.000
	Carlsson  18'  42' Rosén  31'  37'	Report	Seebach  3' John Hansen  77'

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11 August 1948 18:30	Great Britain	1–3	Yugoslavia	Empire Stadium, Wembley Referee: Karel van der Meer (NED) Attendance: 40.000
	Donovan  20'	Report	Bobek  19' Wölfl  24' Mitić  48'

Bronze medal match

13 August 1948 14:00	Great Britain	3–5	Denmark	Empire Stadium, Wembley Attendance: 50,000 Referee: Karel van der Meer (NED)
	Aitken  5' Hardisty  33' Amor  63' (p.k.)	Report	Præst  12'  49' John Hansen  16'  77' J. Sørensen  41'

Gold medal match

13 August 1948 18:30	Sweden	3–1	Yugoslavia	Empire Stadium, Wembley Referee: William Ling (GBR) Attendance: 60.000
	Gren  24'  67' (p.k.) G. Nordahl  48'	Report	Bobek  42'

Medalists

Gold	Silver	Bronze
Sweden	Yugoslavia	Denmark
Torsten Lindberg Karl Svensson Knut Nordahl Erik Nilsson Birger Rosengren Bertil Nordahl Sune Andersson Gunnar Gren Gunnar Nordahl Henry Carlsson Nils Liedholm Börje Leander	Franjo Šoštarić Miroslav Brozović Branko Stanković Zlatko Čajkovski Miodrag Jovanović Aleksandar Atanacković Prvoslav Mihajlović Rajko Mitić Franjo Wölfl Stjepan Bobek Željko Čajkovski Kosta Tomašević Ljubomir Lovrić Zvonimir Cimermančić Bernard Vukas	Knud Bastrup-Birk Hans Colberg Edvin Hansen John Hansen Jørgen W. Hansen Karl Aage Hansen Erik Kuld Jensen Ivan Jensen Ove Jensen Hans Viggo Jensen Per Knudsen Knud Lundberg Eigil Nielsen Knud Børge Overgaard Poul Petersen Axel Pilmark Johannes Pløger Carl Aage Præst Holger Seebach Erling Sørensen Jørgen Leschly Sørensen Dion Ørnvold

Statistics

Goalscorers

7 goals

• Gunnar Nordahl
• John Hansen

5 goals

• Kjell Rosén
• Henry Carlsson
• Francesco Pernigo

4 goals

• Stjepan Bobek

3 goals

• Gunnar Gren
• Željko Čajkovski
• Bob Hardisty
• Emidio Cavigioli
• Servaas Wilkes

External links

• Olympic Football Tournament London 1948, FIFA.com
• RSSSF Archive