Greece 2004
Denmark’s run from the beach to the trophy in 1992 might outrank this on some upsetometers – Greece after all had qualified for the tournament they went on to win, and rather handsomely at that – but Richard Moller Nielsen was able to call on players of genuine class such as Peter Schmeichel and Brian Laudrup, fifth and sixth in the voting for the Ballon d’Or that year, and the Danes had some degree of big‑tournament experience. True, the former Leicester midfielder and current MEP Theo Zagorakis was fifth on Fifa’s list 12 years later, having been named the official player of the tournament in Portugal, but he was an unlikely hero (his performances earned him a move to Bologna in Serie A, where the owner, Giuseppe Gazzoni Frascara, welcomed him as “our Greek Baggio, our Aegean Baggino”; within a year they had been relegated, and Zagorakis had been released) and Greece had never previously won a game at a major international competition. “The target was to win a game,” said the midfielder Vasilis Tsiartas. “Just one game. That would have counted as a success: winning just once.” The Observer predicted they would fail “to get out of the group, however the heat could mean they pick up a point against Russia”; in the end Russia were the only team they lost to. They beat the hosts in the opening game, squeezed into the knockout rounds after Portugal beat Spain in the final group match and then plotted a low-scoring path to glory, with France, the Czech Republic (after extra time) and Portugal again in the final all beaten 1-0. “The Greeks have made football history,” their German coach, Otto Rehhagel, said. “It’s a sensation. There are always surprises – this time we are the surprise.”
Guadeloupe 2007
Guadeloupe’s principal claim to football fame once came from being the birthplace of both Lilian Thuram and Thierry Henry’s dad. In 2007 the little cluster of islands with 400,000 inhabitants somehow ended up in the semi-finals of the Concacaf Gold Cup, where they completed a line-up that also included Canada (population 33 million), Mexico (113 million) and America (301 million). Led by Jocelyn Angloma, a member of France’s squad at Euro 92 and Euro 96 who had settled into semi-retirement in his homeland with Etoile de Morne-à-l’Eau and turned 42 six weeks after the tournament (the former Manchester City and Sheffield United centre-back David Sommeil and the future Swindon and Cardiff defender Miguel Comminges were also in the squad), Guadeloupe opened their first ever Gold Cup with a 1-1 draw against Haiti, before shocking Canada in their second game, Angloma scoring with a 35-yard lob-volley to set the team on their way to a 2-1 win. Angloma again – who made his name as a full-back but played for Guadeloupe on the wing – scored the opening goal in a 2-1 quarter-final win over Honduras, who would qualify for the next World Cup. Mexico stood between the Gwada Boys and a fairytale final, but though they clung on until deep into the second half this was a step too far, and they lost 1-0. “We wanted teams to stand up and recognise Guadeloupean football,” said Roger Salnot, their coach. “Guadeloupe is an island of 400,000 people whereas Mexico is powerful and has millions and millions. We have managed to provide the experience of beautiful Guadeloupean football.”
Bulgaria, 1994
When the qualifying draw was made for USA 94 Bulgaria were down with the no-hopers in Group D. Sure, they had the brilliant Barcelona forward Hristo Stoichkov in their ranks but he had not prevented them finishing fourth in their qualifying group for Euro 92 (won by Scotland), and coming bottom of their qualifying group for Italia 90, and they made it to the USA had it not been for David Ginola. With 20 seconds of their final qualifier to play, the French had the draw they needed and the winger had the ball near the right corner flag. One wildly overhit cross and 16 seconds later, Bulgaria had won 2-1 and had booked their place in the finals. Noting that the country’s World Cup record amounted to no wins from 16 previous games, the Guardian’s pre-tournament preview predicted that “the Bulgarians will be among the less-spirited competitors” who “are likely to fall by the wayside before long”. A 3-0 defeat by Nigeria in their opening game was not promising but then came a 4-0 thumping of Greece and a 2-0 win over an already-qualified Argentina, and victory on penalties over a Mexico side that failed with their first three spot-kicks – perhaps put off by Bobby Mikhailov’s new hair weave (“Vanity,” he sniffed, “is not a crime”) – brought them to a quarter-final with Germany. Iordan Letchkov, who blamed his own baldness on Chernobyl and compared himself with Madonna (“I am a fan of her music. She is a full-blooded singer and I’m a full-blooded soccer player”) crowned what the Guardian described as “a wonderfully spontaneous exhibition of inventive football” with the deciding goal in a 2-1 win. The run ended there, with Roberto Baggio’s brace deciding the semi-final in Italy’s favour (though the Bulgarians accused the referee, a Frenchman, of harbouring grudges) and an only slightly less unlikely semi-finalist, Sweden, romped to a 4-0 win in the third place play-off.
Wales 2016
There are similarities between the Greek run and the Welsh – Greece were ranked 35th in the world when they went into Euro 2004, compared with Wales’s 26th, but both were in the lowest-ranked fourth pot in the draw and beat the team ranked No2 in their quarter-final. But bookmakers priced Wales at 80-1 before kick-off to Greece’s 150-1, reflecting the fact that Chris Coleman’s side benefited from an enlarged competition that opened up qualifying and simplified the group stages, as well as from Gareth Bale’s ability. “There are no mugs in this group and no easy games,” said Coleman, after they had been put in the same qualifying group as Belgium and Bosnia-Herzegovina, though at no point did the task of finishing at least third in a pool that also included Andorra, Cyprus and Israel look beyond them. Still, when qualification was achieved and Bale said “it doesn’t stop here – we have business to do in France,” few thought they would still be doing that business in early July. They have also brought more joy to the neutral than the defensively focused Greek side, most of all in the spellbinding 3-1 victory over Belgium, and this is a story that could still get better.
Poland 1974
Before 1974 Poland had played one World Cup match in their history, a rip-roaring 6-5 first-round defeat by Brazil 36 years earlier. When they were thrown into the same qualifying group as Wales and England, the Guardian trilled the draw “could not have been more favourable” for the English. It did not work out that way: Alf Ramsey’s side lost 2-0 in Chorzow to what the Guardian considered “an eager but hardly formidable Polish team”, and before the return Brian Clough infamously dismissed their goalkeeper, Jan Tomaszewski, as “a clown”. He proceeded to have the game of his life in a 1-1 draw that secured Poland’s place in the finals, and ended Ramsey’s reign as England manager. Even so, it was hardly an overwhelming qualifying campaign, and Poland were not considered much of a threat when the tournament began – “In their preparations for the World Cup,” the Guardian reported, “Poland lacked speed and several observers felt that they were resorting increasingly to muscle power rather than technical talents.” But then they flourished. Their right winger Grzegorz Lato, who had scored three goals in 13 internationals before the tournament, won the golden boot with seven; in their three first-round group games they scored 12 times, beating Italy 2-1, Argentina 3-2 – “one of the finest matches for tension, excitement and superlative skill that the competition will produce,” we enthused – and thumping Haiti 7-0. In the second group stage they beat Sweden and Yugoslavia before finally losing 1-0 to the hosts and eventual champions – Paul Breitner, the German full-back, described Poland as “definitely the best team in the competition … fundamentally better than us”. There were no semi-finals but Poland qualified for the third-place play-off, where they crowned their tournament with a 1-0 win over Brazil.
