How Argentina won the 1978 World Cup

Norman Fox reports from Buenos Aires on the games, the players and the politics of the 1978 World Cup.

The eleventh World Cup began not on June 1 in the River Plate Stadium Buenos Aires but in 1964.

It was 14 years ago that Argentina was first mentioned as a possible venue and the strength of the opposition often threatened to remove it from the sportting calendar. Political uncertainty and doubts over the ability of the country to provide adequate facilities continuually nagged at the International Foottball Federation who obstinately refused to re-consider.

That the competition was held at all did not turn a wrong decision into the right one but in truth Argentina provided a site deserving of better football, although there could be no commplaint over the number of exciting matches or the drama of the last few days when the hosts deservedly reached the final with Holland.

The magnificent River Plate Stadium was the centre piece of a widespread competition that stretched across the country from the cold sea side resort of Mar Dell Plata where it snowed, to the wine growing leafy splendour of Mendoza in the foot hills of the Andes. Let it be said that whatever reservations one had about Argentina's right to hold the World Cup and their ability to do so, facilities were outstanding. Indeed one or two players remarked that the organisers had spent so much time and money designing beautiful grounds that they forgot to concentrate on the pitches. Even the River Plate Stadium surface was not true.

That poor surface was immediately obvious as West Germany (the champpions) and Poland played out the fourth successive goal-less opening matches. Allthough there were far better games later in the tournament, that one confirmed the fears that international football standards had fallen quite significantly since the Germans won the Cup in Munich four years before, and, of course, many people will trace a deecline further back.

West Germany had lost so many of their outstanding players, not least the incomparable Beckenbauer, that they did remarkably well to get so far in their defence with Helmut Schon, the veteran manager, cleverly employing limited reesources.

This draining of the world's leading characters in the game either through reetirement or the call of cash in the United States, undoubtedly led to the generally unimpressive nature of so much footabll seen in Argentina, especially in the first fortnight. '

The Dutch had not persuaded Johan Cruyff to join them and, like the Gerrmans, they had more success than they expected. Neither they nor the Germans had any right to think that the rest of the world would stand still and let them keep up. But that happened and one looked in vain for successors with someething fresh to offer.

There were survivors of 1974 like Rivelino, Rensenbrink and Rep.: but they tended to fade as the competition moved on, though the latter two reegained their best form at the end. Those who caught the eye often proved to be defenders like Tresor or the unfortunate French team which went home after the first round despite playing some splendid ad venturous football, especiially against the hosts in Buenos Aires.

Others to impress were Benetti of the Italian mid field, and Gentile, of that team's defence. Cubillas, the Peru- . vian forward was probably the most skillful and quickest of them all, but his team was not strong enough in the end. Kempes, suave and brave, burst into the vacancy for a deadly finisher when he scored four times for Argentina, twice against the stoney faced, hard limbed Poles, and twice again in that memorrable clirnatic match against Peru.

That was not to say the tournament lacked in excitement. There were several thrilling games and among the most enthralling of any World Cup was that meeting of France and Argentina. France was infuriatingly unfortunate to have a dubious penalty awarded against them by a referee who was over generrous to Argentina but refused France when one of their players was blatently tripped. Lacombe, scorer of the commpetition's first and one of its most spectacular goals against Italy by diving to head in a centre after less than a minute at Mar Dell Plata, was now supported by Bathenay, one of the best players produced by France in recent years. However Italy still won and went on to establish themselves as "the side running into . form at the right moment," as the commentators who favoured them described them.

It had always been felt that in an open World Cup without an outstanding favourite, the team making quickest progress in the tournament itself would have the best chance.

That the referee was rarely as poor as in the French game with italy was reefreshingly unexpected. Knowing the Latin temperament and the physical velocity of the European game, fears for a violent World Cup were widely expresssed and when, on only the second day, a Portuguese official allowed. Hungary to react to Argentina's customary and irriitating habit of petty body checking by . viciously kicking anyone who came near; those doubts seemed to have justiification. Two Hungarians were sent off, thus effectively ending that country's challenge but the match was never in control.

Abraham Klein, an Israeli referee put matters to rights when he refused to show favour to the home country in a significant match against Italy. The Italians, built around the Juventus dub team, turned from their all out attack in the first two matches against France and Hungary to play in their familiar counter-attacking style. Argentina hit them with almost frenzied pace and strength, with the River Plate Stadium audience screaming support, but again Benetti was totally dependable and Causio always flying on the wing.

There was no doubt that Italy deeserved their 1-0 win, a victory that cost Argentina their place at the main stadium. For the second round the hosts had to be based at the much smaller ground in Rosario, but it made no diffference to their progress.

The notable non-qualifiers were France and Scotland, though for quite opposite reasons. France were well orrganised; thoroughly professional, studied their opposition in advance, reeacted well to any situation and were a great loss to the tournament.

Scotland did none of those things and were certainly no loss. A belated and, it has to be said, excellent perrformance in defeating the Dutch finaalists 3-2 when three dear goals were needed, did not erase much more than the edges of, bad feeling surrounding their second successive World Cup failure.

This time it was an exercise in ineptitude from the beginning when the English language Buenos Aires Herald took pleasure in reporting that the team made merry soon after they arrived at the Sierras Hotel in Alta Gracia, to the end when everyone went home not even leaving anyone to watch Austria whom Scotland will meet in the European Championship next season.

It was alleged that whiskey ran freely among the players that night after arriival and that few were in bed by 3 a.m. The Herald also noted that the manager, Ally MacLeod, said they could eat and drink whatever they liked. if MacLeod ever said that it was the first of many frivolous unfortunate statements that plunged Scotland deeper : and deeper into a quickening whirlpool of publiicity.

The Scots went on to attract more attention than many of the teams who qualified for the second round. Much of it was unjustified, much of it based on unfounded rumours and a lot of it was paid for. Some of it was undoubtedly true.

Whatever may be said by those playyers who kept diaries on life at Alta Gracia - and it would be revealing .to know who prompted them to take this sudden interest in becoming diarists the presence of newspaper reporters who had seen less football in their lives than President Videla before the World Cup began, did more to ruin Scotland's reasonably good chances of reaching the last four than the physical effects of a few drinks.

Having every move, every rumour reeported back home was probably more debilitating and could not be trained off, although without doubt thy manager was lax in allowing the sparks of these stories to be ignited.

One of the younger players was said to have been so shaken by a telephone call from his wife, Saying that if half the rumours about wine, women and song were true, he could stay in Argentina, that he went on to the field ~or the next match with only one thought which was to get home as soon as possible.

MacLeod, showing the naivety one had always suspected, quickly compounded the delicate situation that had arisen after the Scots were easily beaten 3-1 by Peru in the first match.

Apparently unaware of the insatiable apptitude of the international press for quotes that condemn people out of their own mouths, he continued to ride the hysterical balloon of false confidence that had risen f~om Hampden Park on the day of the team's departure. He was still beating his chest and talking of pride, Bannockburn and the rest, as his credibility disappeared with the passing days. Foreign journalists questioned his logic' and, in fact, only a few Scots really had any idea what he was talking about.

In. his defence at least he was always there to face his critics and was getting everyone talking about what, until the match with Peru, had been thought of as one of the better outsiders.

Basically, criticism began with his first team selection to play Peru. He insisted on ignoring club form and chose the familiar mid-field of Masson, Rioch and Hartford. Home-based Scottish supporters were also disappointed not to see the most successful of their domestic goal scorers, Derek Johnstone, in the side. In the event, they were proved correct since Jordan conntributed little more than effort and Johnstone was not given a match.

Scotland had received a warning that this team had limitations when it was beaten by England in Glasgow. Admitttedly Peru were not originally thought likely to be in the class of the emerging England side, but it was known that they had some excellent ball players and had to be taken seriously.

It is now well documented history that Jordan gave Scotland a lead and that Masson missed a penalty. Peru scored just before half time and twice more in the second half. Cubbilas, the one Peruvian forward of truly known international fame, was treated like any' other player and it was this seeming lack of homework that so grieved the little band· of Scottish supporters.

Even allowing for a background of bad publicity, the news that Willie Johnston, the West Brornich Albion winger, had failed a dope test was the most unwelcome yet. The repercusssions will go on for a long while esspecially ias FIF A has ordered an ennquiry in Scotland and England. Johnnston himself will not play for Scotland again, but I suspect that the whole nasty business will be swept away by the new broom of a fresh club season.

So without Johnston who had been sent home, Scotland went out to face the complete outsiders, Iran, desperate in spirit and fight. Macl.eod' had at least brought ever-busy Archie Gemmill into the team with Lou Macari, who had not played for some time but was worth his place. Robertson took Johnston's place without much more effect than his disgraced predecessor and whereas Peru had come out and played, Iran put up a defence. Scotland did nothing more than emphasise that they did not have the right answers to either situation and a draw with Iran scoring both goals, was all they deserved.

The supporters who had travelled seven thousand miles were obviously affected and showed their annoyance by jeering Scotland out of the stadium. Some went home immediately but those who bothered to watch Scotland's last game against Holland in Mendoza were in part rewarded by an exciting game which the Dutch could not afford to lose too heavily.

This time MacLeod had at last inncluded Souness one of the essential cogs when Liverpool won last season's European Cup. Souness transferred all of his talents to this desperate situation and after a wonderful goal from Gemmill, certainly among the best in the whole World Cup, Scotland were, for a while, on the point of embarrasssing their critics by (dismissing all that had gone before in a few minutes of traditional, firey purposeful football.

But the Dutch even without Cruyff proved to be one of the more exciting teams of the competition and immediaately they got into difficulties at 3-1, Rep broke away and scored with a memorably long drive. Yet it was a reemarkable and sad performance by a Scottish team discredited and thinking of home. Mutiny, not victory, would have been more easily understood but they played with great heart and enough skill to believe than in other circummstances they could have reached the third place final. The Dutch who went oil to reach the final itself said the Scots were their most difficult opponents.

The players themselves had probably taken over after MacLeod had shown and admitted his own inexperience. "Perhaps I have something to learn", he said as the press at home called for and were not given his head. In the isolation of his hotel, which was one of the causes of the players' boredom, he was probably too detached to be conscious of the deep hurt among the supporters.

In the almost permanent uproar over Scotland's affairs it was easy to overrlook the fact that some teams of tradiitional pedigree were also struggling.

The Germans, still trying to solve problems in the centre of their defence and unsure about the scoring potential of their forwards, soon justified their own doubts. Although they scored six against the outclassed Mexicans, they failed to score at all against Tunisia. The African representatives who showed more aggression than was expected when beating Mexico and losing by only one goal to Poland but were, not surrprisingly, less inclined to have a go at the World Champions. Defensively Tunisia were well organised and Germans might even have lost. Suggesstions that the Germans deliberately plotted a draw to stay in Cordoba for the second round were a little fared considering that at that stage no one could be sure how the groups would be composed.

Being jeered off the field for the second time in the tournament had some effect on the German players who, in the first game of the second round held the favoured Italians and then fought out a repeat of the 1974 final against Holland.

Defensiveness that had taken over the team in the first round was still there in essence, but Germany had to come out and attack. A draw left them still under pressure from the German press critics.

But this criticism was not as fierce or personal as had been Brazilian commplaints after the favourites and three times winners of the World Cup only drew with Sweden and Spain before scraping into the second round through the defeat of Austria. Like many other teams in this competition, Brazil lacked a regular and reliable goal scorer. They were also unhappy about being based at Mar Dell Plata with its cold sea wind, and not everyone sympathised with the intentions of the manager, Claudio Coutinho, to transform Brazilian foottball into a mid-Atlantic montage of style supposedly incorporating the best of the South American rhythm with European practicality.

Rivelino, for one, showed no obvious enthusiasm and after the first round Coutinho was told that the committee would in future have the final word on team selection. The effect was to secure a goal-less draw with Argentina in a stormy match that was a poor advertiseement for South American football.

Not until this Derby game with the old rivals from Brazil was it possible to draw a real conclusion on Argentina's apparent determination not to overrreact to provocation. When the Hunngarians had made several ruthless challenges in the first match it was noticed that Argentina turned a way. They could not resist employing their usual aggravating tactics, including the body checks and unbalancing nudge but generally they kept their tempers even when the Brazilians hammered them with a wide range of ugly fouls.

It would be wrong to assume they were spotless but then there was little of the premeditated aggression that England experienced against them last summer when Bertoni more or less. attacked Cherry.

This immediately made the Argenntine side a more attractive proposition and one could not help feeling probably cynically that here again the public relations exercise in support of a better image for the country was at work.

Not that Argentina needed to whip up enthusiasm locally. From the openning day the population had no doubt that Argentina would reach the final. The suspicion that they were following the team that needed them more than they could know would never have been admitted in the noisy streets of Buenos Aires. Argentina had three fine players in Ardiles, Kempes and Luque but they did not have the balance of Italy or originality of their final opponents Holland. They were carried forward on the shoulders of a devoted crowd that had some sense of predestination.

The style of the Argentine team was in keeping with this impatience for a great victory that would, in some way, change the world's view of the country. Pace was the foundation of their challlenge and after the Luque-Kempes partnership was temporarily broken through injury, the team relied even more on basic speed. Brazil blocked them physically and Italy let them wear themselves down.

Clearly they were more than fallible yet this catching atmosphere that turned the streets to carnival every time they played had a strength of its own. No wonder that Argentines were so displeased with the dull opening match but it was that game rather than the later much more interesting ones in which Argentina were involved, that portrayed the more truthful picture of world football in 1978.

Of the memorable games two came on the same night of a remarkable day that also saw the disappointingly deefensive West Germans lose their title. Brazil, who lead Argentina on goal difference, suddenly shed their innhibitions and reverted to the skillful style of their illustrious past. By beatting the ever determined Poles 3-1 in Mendoza, they left Agrentina in a four clear goal victory over Peru to win.

There were immediate suggestions that Peru would 'throw the match' but nonsense was made of that when they hit the post and generally controlled the game for the first 20 minutes before Argentina stormed away to win 6-0, joining Holland in the final. The Dutch broke down the well organised Italians and were exciting winners with Rensenbrink particularly effective when moved into the attack.

So a World Cup that was not altogetther convincing in its standards did at least have finalists who contributed a great deal to the football of the recent past and present. The Dutch had been undeserving losers in 1974 when their football, of the 'total' kind, was generrally regarded as the best in the world. Now they had to face a host country in a final for the second time in four years and without Cruyff.

The surprising aspect of their achievvement was that they had left behind many other highly talented players inncluding the Ajax centre forward, Geels, Peters, and van Hanegem. Even when they arrived their manager Ernst Happel, an Austrian, did not seem to know exxactly who he wanted in the team. But he made a good job of studying the opposition, notably Italy, for the match that secured a place in the final, and shuffled his pack of players according to the needs of the day. In Krol he had an admirable captain who brought out the lesser known men around him, inncluding Brandts, who scored an own goal in the match with Italy but reedeemed himself by scoring the eq ualiising goal before Haan got the winner.

Argentina's spectacular arrival in the final by way of that overwhelming victory over Peru was in keeping with their style of the whole tournament. Their game was based on vitality and attack. They certainly did not have a reliable enough defence to do anyything else but when Kempes and Luque formed the most exciting and efficient partnership in the competition there was no holding them. Their physical strength was superb and most of it was channelled in the right direction, so confounding critics who had suggested they would be the ones to cause trouble from the beginning. Cesar Menotti, their young manager, chain smoked his way through the tournament like a condemmned prisoner in his dug out by the pitch. He knew how easily the bubble of confidence could have burst and left the World Cup to others with defensive ideas.

It was perhaps characteristic of the tournament that the best football and the almost forgotten Brazilian magic should have been reserved for the antiiclimatic third place playoff on the eve of the World Cup final. It was particuularly pleasing to note the re-appearance of Rivelino, who dominated the middfield once he came on as a substitute. It was a delight to see this swarthy, sinister figure take hold of the situation but it was sad to reflect that Brazil failed to make it to the final by denying their own instinctive football genius which flowed only in that meaningless encounnter with the Italians.

World Cup finals have traditionally been disappointments but though the standard of sportsmanship and football was short of superlative, few could have remained immune from the tension and boiling excitement of the Argentina Holland contest. In the event the poorer team of the day won, thanks to the over-charged atmosphere and quite the worst refereeing the tournament had witnessed. Holland dominated the enntire second half and much of the first.

Their much suspected defence adeequately containued the explosive Argenntinian attack, except for the few deciisive and characteristic bursts by Kempes, and the Dutch midfield played the hosts off the pitch. But it was the also much suspected Argentinian defence that came to the host's rescue and kept them in the game in the second half when they might otherwise have been a few goals in arrears.

The Argentines looked a pedestrian side in the final. Only Kempes seemed world class and even his two goals were a shade lucky. But the other stars, Luque and Ardilles, were notable dissappointments, neither recovered from injuries which kept them out of earlier matches.

For the Dutch, Rensenbrink, the brothers van der Kerkhof, Haan and Krol, with the latter being the most outtstanding, were all impressive and must feel cheated to have been deprived of the World Cup for the second time, though they had nowhere as considerrable grounds for frustration against West Germany.

It was a disappointing tournament on the whole, punctuated by moments of brilliance and joy, but all too few of them. In the end the best four teams won through to the finals and third round playoffs, but apart from these, memories of Tunisia and France will linger.

Mario Kempes emerged as the star of the tournament but there were all to few to challenge him for that honour .•