The Names Heard Long Ago

"Before Johan Cruyff and Diego Maradona, modern soccer was shaped by legends like Gusztâav Sebes, Bâela Guttman, Mâarton Bukovi, Egri Ebstein, and Imre Herschel. In the 1920s and 1930s, they gathered with fellow players and coaches in the coffeehouses Budapest and invented soccer as we know it today. By the 1940s their culture was gone and these men and women, many of whom were Jewish, would be dead, interned, or in exile, their contributions to the beautiful game forgotten. In The Names Heard Long Ago, Jonathan Wilson invites readers into the pre-World War II era, when Hungary first established professional leagues. An unprecedented number of middle-class people in both countries took an interest in the sport. They were largely university educated, and they instinctively applied academic techniques and analysis to the game. The Names Heard Long Ago is as much about the individuals who cultivated the way the game is played as it is a tale of a way of life that was wiped out by fascism"--