By the 1950s English football had reached remarkable heights of popularity that few could ever have dreamt of. Post war attendances at most English League grounds had peaked and the likes of Arsenal and Charlton were boasting record crowds of 70 to 80,000. The working class game had suddenly blossomed in a way that only the most foolhardy could have predicted. After all Britain had just broken free of the never ending nightmare of the Second World War.

But at the beginning of the decade England’s footballing pride took the most improbable battering On a hot afternoon in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, England suffered a humiliating defeat in the 1950 World Cup- a 1-0 defeat against the United States. So great was the shock that even the sceptical Americans thought they had lost 10-0. Larry Gaetjens popped up to head home the winner and England licked its wounds.

But it was in 1953 that English football would get its biggest upset to its nervous system. For years the English game had laboured under the delusion that nobody could touch it for class and style. England invented football and therefore we were the greatest- or so we thought.

On a foggy November afternoon at Wembley eleven Hungarians taunted and teased the English with some of the silkiest ball skills anybody had ever seen. ‘The Mighty Magyars’ as the Hungarians were known, played with a poise and purity that swept England away. There was the Ferenc Puskas, a tubby genius who tormented Billy Wright’s English defence, Hidgekuti, a wizard on and off the ball, and the destructive team of Czibor and Bozsik.

However, it was the birth of the European Cup in 1955 by Frenchman Gabriel Hanot that changed English attitudes. One side in particular Real Madrid would dominate the competition in years to come. In their first European Cup against Reims Di Stefano, the slippery Gento and Puskas gave French side Reims the run around.

After League champions Chelsea had decided not to play in the second year of the competition, it was left to Matt Busby’s Manchester United to fly the flag for England. In one unforgettable game at Old Trafford, United rattled 10 goals past Belgian side Anderlecht. Tragically, the Busby Babes, United’s gifted side were killed on a Munich runaway when their plane failed to take off. The brilliance of Duncan Edwards had died before it had had time to live.