The Dark Age in Intercontinental Cup, FIFA Club World Cup Predecessor

 

The FIFA Club World Cup predecessor, the Intercontinental Cup, was once notorious for its dark years involving real violence on the pitch.

The FIFA Club World Cup (CWC) might have just been held for the first time in the new millennium back in 2000. Yet, this tournament has a long history with shocking facts on and off the pitch. Its predecessor, the Intercontinental Cup, had an unbelievable tale in the late 1960s and 1970s, once raising concern about its future before being revitalised in the 1980s. 

The Intercontinental Cup, not the one with ‘FIFA’ at the front, was once not recognised by the world football governing body despite being endorsed by the two strongest regional football confederations in the world, UEFA and CONMEBOL. It was only considered ‘a friendly match’ by FIFA. Yet, its prestige was still well recognised globally, as it featured the duel of the best clubs from Europe and South America. They are undoubtedly still the ones at the top level of international football. 

The Intercontinental Cup was meant to be an exclusive match to determine the best club in the world, despite not including those from Africa, North and Central America and Asia. There had been constant rejection to include them in the tournament until FIFA took over it since the clubs from those regions were not regarded at the same level as Europe and South America. 

However, it was seen rather differently between those two sides. For Europeans, the Intercontinental Cup was considered unprofitable except for the prestige and a rare opportunity against the Latin American giants and stars. On the other hand, their South American counterpart saw it as a chance to prove to the world that their football style is better than the rigid European. Such an opinion goes on up to this date. UEFA sides even display their disinterest bluntly with the expanded 2025 FIFA CWC, as it potentially worsens the players’ wellness.

These two opposite views on the competition might lead to their motivation and progress in the final round. Yet, it would not turn into an actual open conflict between those confederations and their teams.

Nevertheless, such conflict did happen, especially between those teams squaring off on the pitch. In the late 1960s and 1970s, the Intercontinental Cup’s reputation went to the downfall due to several reasons. Here is what happened to it during that period.

The Brutality on the Pitch 

The dark age of the Intercontinental Cup began with the rise of Argentina and Uruguay clubs, which became the new champions of the Copa Libertadores in the late 1960s by relying more on negative football, violent tackles, and faults in contrast to Brazilians’ jogo bonito. They did not only apply such tactics in the CONMEBOL competitions but carried on doing so in the Intercontinental Cup.

The 1967 edition was the first one where Europeans saw such brutality on the pitch. At that time, European Cup champions Glasgow Celtic faced off against Argentina’s Racing Club. The duel was still contested in two legs at that time. The Scottish side picked up a narrow 1-0 win at home but lost 2-1 in the reverse fixture. Since the away goal rule was not yet introduced back then, both teams had to square off in the neutral venue for the replay to decide the winner. At that time, if both sides won one game each, they shared the same points of winning, which equaled two points, instead of three point as today. The goal aggregate was not considered as well.

The playoff match was held in Estadio Centenario, Montevideo, only three days after the second leg. Uruguay fans were known as supporting Celtic instead of their neighbouring side. Unfortunately, the violence remained, as the referee even had to send off six players, two from Racing Club and four from the Scottish champions. The Argentine eventually came out as a winner with a single goal from Jose Cardenas’ long-range shot.

That was the beginning of its dark age, as the brutal acts were displayed again in the next five editions. Such led to the European Cup winners’ reluctance to play in the Intercontinental Cup, leading to the team replacements and even cancellation.

Edition	Matches	Violence on the pitch	Aftermath
1967	Celtic vs Racing Club 1-0	Racing Club’ excessive fouls and spitting on Celtic players ; Celtic’s Jimmy Johnstone’s hair soaked from Racing Club’s spit, Billy McNeil’s black eye, Bertie Auld’s being headbutted, Bobby Lennox’s earache.
	Racing Club vs Celtic 2-1	Celtic’s goalie Ronnie Simpson’s head struck by heavy object till injured; Celtic’s dressing room attacked by home fans.	Celtic fans from Uruguay and home fans engaged in the battle outside the stadium.
	Racing Club vs Celtic 1-0 (playoff)	Two melees between players from both sides; six red cards with total 51 fouls (30 for Celtic and 21 for Racing) plus some unnoticed fouls including when Racing Club’s player was kicked in his vital organ; Uruguayan Celtic fans threw stuff on Racing Club players on the pitch after the game.	Celtic players were fined £250 for their misconduct by their own chairman
1968	Estudiantes vs Man Utd 1-0	MU’s Nobby Stiles punched, headbutted and kicked before responding evenly and sent off, Bobby Charlton suffering wounds on the head
	Man Utd vs Estudiantes 1-1	Two red cards for each team, MU’s George Best punched and spat Estudiantes’ Jose Medina and pushed Nestor Togheri; Home fans throwing coins at Medina before going to the dressing room; MU players punching their opposition after the whistle; Home fans kept throwing objects to Estudiantes players during their lap of honor.
1969	AC Milan vs Estudiantes 3-0	-
	Estudiantes vs AC Milan 2-1	Milan players harshly disturbed by Estudiantes’ Alberto Poletti and Ramon Suarez while practicing before the match; Home fans pouring hot coffee to Milan players while entering the pitch; Nestor Combin kicked and punched till breaking his cheekbone, bleeding and fainted; Milan star, Gianni Rivera punched by Estudiantes goalie, Alberto Poletti; Pierino Prati knocked unconscious on the pitch but the game carried on;	Nestor Combin was mistakenly arrested by local police and even stayed one night in jail due to draft dodging accusation (avoiding military service as he was born in Argentina), before eventually being released after explaining his completion in France as a French citizen; Alberto Poletti banned from sport for life, Ramon Suarez and Eduaredo Manera banned for 30 and 20 matches by AFA plus serving in jail for a month.
1970	Estudiantes vs Feyenoord 2-2	-
	Feyenoord vs Estudiantes 1-0	Feyenoord’s Joop van Daele’s glasses were trampled and crushed by Estudiantes’ Carlos Pachame.
1971	Panathinaikos vs Nacional 1-1	Panathinaikos’s Yiannis Tomaras broken his leg by brutal tackle plus unconscious resulting a red card for Nacional’s Juan Morales
	Nacional vs Panathinaikos 2-1	-
1972	Independiente vs Ajax 1-1	Johan Cruyff receiving death threats from home fans; Cruyff injured due to brutal tackle from Dante Mircoli; Ajax players punched and assaulted on the pitch.
	Ajax vs Independiente 3-0	-

Team Replacements

The series of violence and brutal acts on the pitch had led to the European Cup champions’ reluctance and rejections to take on the CONMEBOL sides. Such an opinion was even more justified when Brazilian sides also refused to compete in three editions of the Copa Libertadores, 1966, 1969 and 1970, for the same reason plus being deemed as financially unprofitable for the teams. No wonder that the Argentine and Uruguayan sides were dominating the continental competition.

During the decade, there had been five team replacements for the Intercontinental clash. European Cup champions were mainly replaced by their runners-up. The first one was Greece’s Panathinaikos in 1971. Ferenc Puskas’ side replaced Ajax Amsterdam to take on Uruguay’s Nacional.

The Dutch’s concern was confirmed following another brutal tackle of Panathinaikos’s defender, Yiannis Tomaras, in the first leg at their home turf. He even had to be substituted, as he was unconscious after the blow.

In the next four editions, Juventus, Atletico Madrid, Borussia M’Gladbach and Malmo stepped forward to cover Ajax, Bayern Munich, Liverpool and Nottingham Forest’s absence in 1973, 1974, 1977 and 1979. Among those European runners-up, only Los Rojiblancos managed to lift the trophy. Luis Aragones’ side remains the only non-European champions who won the title to date in this tournament. They were able to bounce back in a 2-0 win over Independiente after losing 1-0 in the reverse fixture. One of their goalscorers was the former Deportivo La Coruña boss who led them to win their only La Liga title in 2000, Javier Irureta.

Team replacement	Result	Notable players (managers)
1971 – Panathinaikos (replacing Ajax Amsterdam)	vs Nacional (Uruguay) 2-3 (1-1; 1-2)	Mimis Domazos, Anthimos Kapsis, Sakis Kouvas (Ferenc Puskas)
1973 – Juventus (replacing Ajax)	vs Independiente (Argentina ) 0-1 (Juventus refused to play in Buenos Aires. Thus, it was settled in a one-off match in Rome instead)	Dino Zoff, Claudio Gentile, Jose Altafini, Roberto Bettega (Cestmir Vycpalek)
1974 – Atletico Madrid (replacing Bayern Munich)	vs Independiente (Argentina) 2-1 (0-1;2-0)	Javier Irureta, Roberto Ayala, Ramon Heredia (Luis Aragones)
1977 – Gladbach (replacing Liverpool)	vs Boca Juniors (ARG) 2-5 (2-2; 0-3) (The match did not take place until 1978 due to the schedule issue)	Bertie Vogts, Allan Simonsen, Rainer Bonhof (Udo Lattek)
1979 – Malmo (replacing Nottingham Forest)	vs Olimpia (Paraguay) 1-3 (0-1; 1-2)	Tommy Hansson, Thomas Sjoberg (Bobby Houghton)

Match Cancellation

Besides team replacement, in some editions the Intercontiental Cup was cancelled due to different reasons. In 1976, Bayern Munich was reportedly unable to find suitable date for the clash against Independiente. Yet, they managed to make them available in the following year when Die Roten only faced the nonviolent side, the Brazillian team. Cruzeiro happened to be the champion.

Such a decision was questioned,, as the German powerhouse seemed to be disinterested when the opposition was from Argentina or Uruguay,, whose tactics were notoriously brutal. Yet, they had no problem when meeting the Brazilian side.

However, such a claim was denied by Bayern boss himself, Dettmar Cramer, stating that the match was not sufficiently profitable for the team. That was their main reason to ditch the game in 1974 and 1975. That was the year when South American champions happened to be Argentina’s Independiente.

Meanwhile, in 1978, Liverpool declined to face off against Boca Juniors. UEFA then sent Belgium’s Club Bruges to take on CONMEBOL champions. Unfortunately, Boca rejected it instead. Consequently, there was no match in 1978.

After the dark days in the 1970s, the new decade brought a new lease of life to the competition. Thanks to Japan, who arrived with their main sponsor, Toyota, alongside its legal agreement in the contract for both confederations to salvage the competition and put its dark age to an end in 1980. It was said that each continental champion had to square off for the clash. If one of them had rejected, they would have faced an international lawsuit from both Toyota and UEFA. One of the UEFA sides that considered doing so was Barcelona in 1992 but eventually agreed to face off against Sao Paulo due to its complexity.