Our North Korea tale on May 26 brought a response from a Dundee reader — along with a few theories.
Our story centred around the Asian country’s shock 1-0 success over the fancied Italy but Tom Black reckons the bigger story was elsewhere.
“Back in 1966 in England, North Korea beating Italy was a huge upset but all the big news was centred on England,” said Tom.
“Having won their first match at Wembley, it was decided by the FA that they should change venues for their next match from a sold-out Anfield to Wembley.
“Strangely, the English supporters in Liverpool didn’t complain too much.
“The real action, though, had still to start . . . England v Argentina.
“Scotland v England was often a hate-filled encounter, hence that fixture rarely taking place these days… even as a friendly.
“What took place at Wembley against Argentina probably explains why the World Cup has never returned to England.
“The only real way to understand exactly what went on is to see a recording of the whole match, with the biased commentary and the manner of the dismissal of the Argentina captain Antonio Rattin.
“The national newspapers the following day referred to the South American players as ‘animals’, although just one of them was sent off — and that was for arguing with the referee.
“English fanatics, numbering 100,000, were baying for blood in that match.
“Since then, every major country has hosted the World Cup — some more than once — but not England.”
While it is great that everyone can air their own opinion, I’ll call Tom to book on several points.
Firstly, I can’t find any information that says Anfield was the original ground named to host an England Group 1 game.
Geography played a large part in allocating the grounds, and London’s Wembley and White City were the only grounds stated to be used in that group.
Group 2 already had Everton’s Goodison Park as a venue, so it would be highly unlikely Anfield would also be used in another group.
However, I would, naturally, stand corrected if any reader provided proof of this.
Secondly, the use of the word ‘animals’ to describe Argentina I remember was actually a direct after-match quote by England manager Alf Ramsay.
It would have been negligent of any newspaper not to have reported that.
Thirdly, I don’t reckon previous England v Scotland encounters were ‘hate-filled’ as many of the players on each side were clubmates.
The fixtures had to be stopped because of the mindless drunkenness and trouble before, during and after games.
Even with authorities having sorted most of that out, England probably quite rightly reckon they have now bigger fish to fry.
Having said that, it’s possible, after the recent resurrected friendly between the countries, that it might be back on every now and then.
As for the Rattin incident, it has been reported thus: “He was sent off by the German referee Rudolf Kreitlein for ‘violence of the tongue’, despite the referee speaking no Spanish.
“Rattin was so incensed with the decision, believing the referee to be biased in favour of England, that he initially refused to leave.
“As a way to show his disgust, he sat on the red carpet which was exclusively for the Queen to walk on.
“He eventually had to be escorted from the field by two policemen and, as a final sign of disgust, he picked a British pennant and tore it up before he was escorted out.”
Rattin played solely for Boca Juniors and turned out over 350 times for them, in addition to winning 34 caps for his country.
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