Soccer History | Stadio Nazionale PNF, Rome — A World Cup Final in a Stadium Named for the Party

The stadium's full name was the Stadio Nazionale del Partito Nazionale Fascista. The 1934 World Cup final was played in it on 10 June, in front of Mussolini. Italy beat Czechoslovakia 2-1 after extra time, Angelo Schiavio scoring the winner past František Plánička. Ivan Eklind of Sweden refereed. The heat is recorded as approaching 40 degrees in the standard reference, and as the high thirties elsewhere. Attendance is given as 55,000 in some accounts and about 50,000 in others. The ground's stated capacity was 47,300, so either figure describes an overfilled stadium. The tournament was a straight knockout. There were no groups, and a tie still level after extra time meant replaying the whole match the following day. Uruguay did not enter. As hosts and winners in 1930 they were still angry that most European nations had refused to make the sea crossing to Montevideo, and they stayed home. England were absent too, committed to a separate international series. The regime worked the tournament hard. More than 300,000 posters were distributed and promotional newsreels were produced, and Mussolini presented the trophy himself before handing the players a second and larger one, the Coppa del Duce, together with signed photographs of himself. Allegations of coercion, bribery and biased refereeing have followed this Italian team ever since. They remain allegations. It is also the case, as the historians who raise them tend to note, that this was one of the strongest squads Italy has ever put out. Both statements sit in the record and neither disposes of the other. The building outlasted the regime by a decade. It had opened on 10 June 1911, exactly twenty-three years to the day before the final, closed in 1953 and was demolished in 1957. The Stadio Flaminio was built on the site, north of the centre off the Via Flaminia, and that is what a visitor finds there now. The images are the ground about an hour before kick-off, and Schiavio's goal. Sources: Wikipedia; RTÉ Brainstorm and Maynooth University; footballhistory.org; The Daily Star. Cover photo: Italian Football Federation, public domain. Goal photograph: unknown author, public domain. Both via Wikimedia Commons.