1974. The Dutch showcase the beauty of football without winning. The only country to reach three World Cup finals and not win one. Total Football began with the great Ajax side of the 1960s and 1970s but at international level it was first seen at the World Cup in West Germany 1974.
Total Football, or Totaalvoetball, isn’t a phrase that the Dutch themselves regularly use, it’s just the way that they play, a way of life. Despite this it has become synonymous worldwide with some of the greatest, free-flowing attacking play and tactical fluidity that not only amazed during the World Cup of 1974 in West Germany but has since shaped football as we know it in the Netherlands, Barcelona and later Germany, and England. From Vic Buckingham through to Rinus Michels, Johan Cruyff, and Pep Guardiola, and the many disciples of Total Football that flowered at each stage, it’s a style of football tactics that runs deep.
It was in West Germany at the 1974 World Cup however, that Total Football changed the perception of how football could be played.
Total football was based around the idea that no single outfield player has a fixed position on the pitch. Instead, fluidity ruled. If the right back carried the ball up field, the right winger would drop back to cover the right back position. If a midfielder drops into defence, the centre back moves forward. A centre forward roaming out of the central focal point position leaves space for wingers and the number 10 to venture into. Alongside the positional fluidity, Total Football also combined a high pressing system where the opposition was swarmed when on the ball and spatial control, where the pitch is expanded in possession and made as small as possible when out of possession.
It was a tactic that was all about the team, and until the World Cup, the shirt numbers were dealt out alphabetically, not by position. Having an iconic, elite footballer in the side like Johan Cruyff would take Total Football to another level. He had the spatial awareness, the deft touch, passing ability, and a bag of tricks that helped him get the better of every player he faced. It was at this World Cup, in a match against Sweden, where the Cruyff turn was born, a move that every child still attempts to replicate on the schoolyard and parks the world over. Cruyff was a maverick, unafraid to speak his mind. Even at the peak of his international career he spoke out for himself in ways that hadn’t been heard before. The Netherlands official kit sponsor was Adidas, but Cruyff was a Puma boy, so he had a custom-made two-striped kit made for him to wear at the World Cup and refused to wear Adidas boots, saying that “the head sticking out of the shirt is mine.”
Ajax had won three European Cups back-to-back prior to the World Cup in 1974, and Feyenoord had also won it by then, but on the international stage the Dutch took the piss with their style of play. They beat Uruguay and Bulgaria in the first group stage, drawing 0-0 in the ‘Cruyff Turn’ match against Sweden, before winning all three group matches in the second phase against Brazil, Argentina, and East Germany. The 4-0 win against Argentina a particular standout. Where the Netherlands knew they might not be able to compete one-on-one against the skill and aggression of the South American teams, Total Football and the system would prevail.
The final against hosts West Germany felt like a good versus evil matchup in the most basic sense. There was still memories of occupation in the Second World War which added an undoubted edge, and the functional German team against the fun and fluid Dutch. Even the boring, white Jerseys against the brilliant Orange of the Dutch. Surely, the Netherlands would win the World Cup?
From the first whistle, the German players could not get near the ball. The Dutch pinged it around in a 16-pass sequence that ended with Cruyff being fouled by Uli Hoeneß in the German penalty box. Johan Neeskens converted the resulting penalty and the Dutch were on their way. Or were they?
The night before the final, the German tabloid newspaper Bild published a front-page story alleging that Dutch players, including Cruyff, had partied late into the night with naked women in the hotel pool. The start of the match and early goal might have pointed to the Dutch not being fazed, but after the goal it was sluggish play, the Dutch looked leggy and West Germany scored twice, with goals from Paul Breitner and Gerd Müller.
The influence of that Dutch side, the brilliant Oranje cannot be understated though, even in defeat.
Rinus Michels had taken the concept of fluid, attacking football of great teams such as the Hungarian ‘Golden Team’ from the 1950s and the ‘Wunderteam’ of Austria in the 1930s, and combined it with the modern conditioning and fitness of the Ajax, and later the Dutch national side, of the 1960s and 1970s.
Cruyff and Michels took Total Football to Barcelona, and Cruyff would later manage the Catalan club. He is a God in Barcelona; the high church of how the game should be played. Everything we understand about the Barcelona way comes from Cruyff. From 1988 to 1996 Cruyff’s Barcelona team would be dubbed the ‘Dream Team’, winning four straight La Liga titles and the clubs first ever European Cup in 1992 at Wembley.
Arrigo Sacchi was selling shoes at the time of the 1974 World Cup, and the style of play he saw on his television screen inspired him. He was another future football coach who would take Total Football into his own tactical awareness and revolution, changing the Italian game just 15 years later with hard-pressing that was unheard of at the time, winning back-to-back European Cups.
There have been many players inspired by their former coach, but none more so than Pep Guardiola, who took what he had learned from Cruyff and has since become possibly the greatest tactical manager in the history of the game, managing maybe the greatest club side of all-time with two European Cup victories with Barcelona in 2009 and 2011, then changing the way both German and English clubs play football after long and successful spells with Bayern Munich and Manchester City. This success and the change in how the elite clubs all the way down the pyramid to lower leagues, non-league, and Sunday league play football can be traced back to Total Football and the 1974 World Cup.
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