History of the England national football team

The history of the England national football team begins with the first representative international match in 1870 and the first officially-recognised match two years later. England competes in the FIFA World Cup, UEFA European Championship, and UEFA Nations League.

The Three Lions first entered the World Cup in 1950 and have since qualified for 16 of the 19 finals tournaments to 2022. Their best performance was during 1966 on home soil as champions. England are therefore one of only eight nations to have won a FIFA World Cup. They have reached the semi-finals on two other occasions: 1990 and 2018. England failed to qualify for the finals in 1974, 1978, and 1994.

England also compete in the UEFA European Championship. During UEFA Euro 2020, they reached the final of the competition for the first time. England have also reached the semi-final of the competition in 1968 and 1996 with the latter held on home soil. England's most capped player is Peter Shilton with 125 caps and its top goalscorers are Wayne Rooney and Harry Kane with 53 goals each.

Early years

1870–1900

England's first international representative matches were arranged by the influential sports administrator Charles Alcock, under the auspices of the Football Association. The first five friendly matches, which all took place at The Oval, London, were played against Scotland between 1870 and 1872. However, these are not considered full internationals by FIFA because the Scotland teams were composed entirely of London-based Scottish players.

England's first FIFA-recognised international football match was a 0–0 draw against Scotland at Hamilton Crescent in Partick, Glasgow, on 30 November 1872. Scotland was represented by players from Glasgow's Queen's Park club. The first England team in this match was:

Robert Barker ( Hertfordshire Rangers), goal; Harwood Greenhalgh ( Notts Club), three-quarter back; R. C. Welch (Harrow Chequers), half back; F. Chappell (Oxford University), fly-kick; capt. Cuthbert Ottaway (Oxford University), middle; Charles Chenery (Crystal Palace), middle; Charles Clegg (Sheffield), middle; Arnold Kirke-Smith (Oxford University), middle; J. Brockbank (Oxford University) right side; W. J. Maynard (1st Surrey Rifles) left side; J. F. Morris ( Barnes Club) left side.

The following year, England beat Scotland 4–2 at the Kennington Oval, but in 1878, a resurgent Scotland thrashed England 7–2 at Hampden Park in Glasgow. This stood as a record for either side in the fixture for 77 years, until England beat Scotland 7–2 at Wembley during the 1955 Home Championship.

1900–1939

Over the next 40 years, most of England's fixtures were against Scotland, Wales and Ireland in the Home Championship. This was partly due to the dominance of the United Kingdom in international football, and the problems of arranging continental internationals before the advent of air travel. England faced their first continental opposition in a tour of Central Europe in 1908, beating Austria, Hungary and Bohemia. England's first defeat outside the British Isles was a 4–3 loss to Spain in Madrid in May 1929.

The England national amateur football team was formed in 1901, when amateur players could no longer easily find places in the main national team. Great Britain, rather than England and other home nations, is represented in the Olympic Games. But the Great Britain teams that won gold medals in the 1908 and 1912 Olympic football tournaments were constituted by England national amateur team players. A similar team was knocked out early in 1920 Olympic football. No Great Britain team entered in 1924 after dispute concerning the regulation of professionalism.

Although the FA had joined FIFA in 1906, the relationship with the British associations was fraught. In 1928, the British nations withdrew from FIFA, in a dispute over payments to amateur players. This meant that England did not enter the first three World Cups. However, they did defeat the 1934 World Cup winners Italy 3–2, in a match dubbed the " Battle of Highbury", in November 1934.

On 1 December 1937, Stanley Matthews scored a hat-trick in England's 5–4 victory over Czechoslovakia. The England team also included Vic Woodley, Wilf Copping, Stan Cullis, Len Goulden, Willie Hall, John Morton and Bert Sproston.

In May 1938, England toured Europe. The first match was against Germany in Berlin. Adolf Hitler wanted the game to be a showcase for Nazi propaganda. While the England players were getting changed, a Football Association official went into their dressing room, and told them that they had to make the Nazi salute during the playing of the German national anthem. Stanley Matthews later recalled:

The FA official left, but returned saying he had a direct order from British Ambassador Sir Neville Henderson that the players must make the salute, because the political situation between Britain and Germany was now so sensitive it needed "only a spark to set Europe alight". Reluctantly the England team raised their right arms, except for Stan Cullis who refused, and was subsequently dropped from the squad.

The game was watched by 110,000 people as well as senior Nazis, including Hermann Göring and Joseph Goebbels. England won the game 6–3. The game included a goal scored by Goulden that Matthews described as "the greatest goal I ever saw in football". According to Matthews:

On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Three days later, Neville Chamberlain declared war on Germany. The government immediately imposed a ban on the assembly of crowds resulting in the end of all league football matches apart from some unofficial wartime internationals played between 11 November 1939 and 5 May 1945, for which the largest crowd was 133,000 on 24 April 1944 and again on 14 April 1945 in matches at Hampden Park.

Post-war era

1950 and 1954 World Cups

Between 27 May 1945 and 19 May 1946, England played seven unofficial victory internationals, an unofficial international match against Scotland on 24 August 1946 (2–2), and unofficial internationals against Switzerland and Switzerland 'B'. The FA rejoined FIFA in 1946, the same year they appointed the first dedicated team manager, Walter Winterbottom (although the team was picked by a committee). Winterbottom's reign began strongly with a series of lopsided victories, providing a false sense of security that the post-war England team had retained its early international preeminence. In 1948, England gained two notable victories, 4–0 against the reigning world champions Italy in Turin, and 10–0 against Portugal in Lisbon, after which the players involved famously became known as the "lions of Lisbon".

England's fortunes then took a sharp decline, losing for the first time against non-UK opposition at home when they were defeated 2–0 by the Republic of Ireland in 1949 at Goodison Park, Liverpool. England's World Cup debut came in 1950; however, they suffered an infamous 1–0 defeat by the United States, and failed to get beyond the first group stage after also losing against Spain in their final game.

England's increasing tactical inferiority was highlighted on 25 November 1953, when Hungary came to Wembley. Fielding legendary players such as Ferenc Puskás, József Bozsik, Sándor Kocsis, Zoltán Czibor and Nándor Hidegkuti, Hungary outclassed England 6–3 – this was England's first home loss to opposition from outside of the British Isles. In the return match in Budapest, Hungary won 7–1, which still stands as the worst defeat in England's history. Ivor Broadis scored England's goal. After the game, the bewildered England centre-half Syd Owen said, "It was like playing people from outer space."

In the 1954 World Cup, two goals by Broadis saw him become the first England player to score two goals in a game at the World Cup finals. In the same match, Nat Lofthouse also scored twice in a 4–4 draw against Belgium. England reached the quarter-finals for the first time, but were eliminated 4–2 by Uruguay. Only twice have England progressed beyond the World Cup quarter-finals away from home.

Munich disaster and the 1958 World Cup

On 15 May 1957, Stanley Matthews made his last appearance for England, in a 4–1 defeat by Denmark in Copenhagen. He was 42 years and 104 days old and remains the oldest player to represent his country.

Hopes of success at the 1958 World Cup finals were hit by the Munich air disaster in February that year, which claimed the lives of eight Manchester United players. Three of the players who died were established England internationals. They were full-back Roger Byrne, who had never missed an England game since making his debut for the country in 1954, centre-forward Tommy Taylor, who had scored 16 goals in just 19 appearances for his country, and wing-half Duncan Edwards, who was then widely regarded as the finest player in English football at that time. Also killed was David Pegg, who had just made his debut for England and was tipped as the successor in the national team to Tom Finney, who retired from international action later in 1958. Winger Johnny Berry, who had been capped four times for England, survived the crash but was injured to such an extent that he never played football again.

Forward Bobby Charlton, who was injured in the crash, recovered sufficiently to make his England debut in April that year and begin one of the great England international careers, which eventually yielded 106 caps, 49 goals and a World Cup winner's medal. He was named in the squad which travelled to Sweden for the World Cup finals, but did not kick a ball as England exited in the group stages after a play-off defeat against the Soviet Union, after the two had finished level in second spot in their group. England's inside forward Johnny Haynes remarked after elimination in 1958, "Everyone in England thinks we have a God given right to win the World Cup." Joe Mears as chief selector became the scapegoat.

England's early elimination highlighted how far the national team had fallen behind the rest of the world during the 1950s. However, by the end of the decade, emerging talents such as the prolific goalscorer Jimmy Greaves suggested that sufficiently talented players were available, provided the tactical side of the game could bring the best out of them.

1960s

World Champions

By the 1960s, English tactics and training had started to improve, and England turned in a respectable performance in the 1962 World Cup in Chile, losing in the quarter-finals to the eventual winners, Brazil. By now, more young players were making their mark, including the elegant young defender Bobby Moore. Indeed, the squad taken by England to Chile was the youngest, on average, ever taken to a major tournament, with no player over the age of 29, the oldest being the 28-year-old Maurice Norman. After Winterbottom retired in 1962, England's former captain Alf Ramsey was appointed and crucially won the right to choose the squad and team himself, taking that role away from the selection committee. Ramsey boldly predicted that England would win the next World Cup, which England were hosting.

Ramsey's prediction came true, and the 1966 World Cup on home soil was England's finest moment. Ramsey's England team were nicknamed the "Wingless Wonders", a phrase coined by the press after Ramsey devised a new 4-3-3 system that relied on hard-running midfield players rather than natural wingers. An unremarkable group phase saw them win two and draw one of their games, with a 30-yard strike by Bobby Charlton at Wembley against Mexico proving a highlight. An injury to the centre-forward Jimmy Greaves in the final group match against France prompted Ramsey into a rethink for the quarter-final against Argentina, and the inexperienced replacement Geoff Hurst responded by scoring the only goal of the game. Charlton then hit both goals in a 2–1 semi-final win over Portugal to take England into the final, where they met West Germany.

By now, Greaves was fit again, but Ramsey kept faith with Hurst, despite calls from the media for the main goalscorer to return. England won the final 4–2 after extra time, with three goals from Hurst and one from Martin Peters. Hurst's second goal became the most controversial in England football history, with West Germany's players protesting that the ball did not fully cross the goal-line after bouncing down from the crossbar. In 1995, researchers from Oxford University announced the results of computer video analysis of the television footage, which gave new angles of view: they concluded that the shot had not crossed the line. Moore became the first and, to date, only England captain to lift the World Cup.

The game prompted a memorable piece of commentary from the BBC
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