This book considers the 1966 World Cup as a key ‘moment of modernity’ in England’s post-war history. The World Cup is examined within the complexity of the cultural, social and political change of the mid-1960s. Although addressing the importance of non-sport related connections, the book maintains a focus on football (soccer), discussing it as a ‘cultural form’ and presenting an original perspective on the aesthetic accomplishment in football tactics by the England team manager, Alf Ramsey. Chapters on the cup tradition and the World Cup and England as a World Cup host nation (with a case stu ... More

This book considers the 1966 World Cup as a key ‘moment of modernity’ in England’s post-war history. The World Cup is examined within the complexity of the cultural, social and political change of the mid-1960s. Although addressing the importance of non-sport related connections, the book maintains a focus on football (soccer), discussing it as a ‘cultural form’ and presenting an original perspective on the aesthetic accomplishment in football tactics by the England team manager, Alf Ramsey. Chapters on the cup tradition and the World Cup and England as a World Cup host nation (with a case study focus on Liverpool as a host city) are followed by chapters on the relations in masculinity between Ramsey and his England team and Ramsey’s strategy for football play considered within the context of English modernism. England’s victory is a key theme in the book and, in this regard, later chapters consider the ways in which the victory has been remembered and commemorated. A chapter is also dedicated to critically discussing existing academic accounts that refer to the ideological construction of a ‘myth of 1966’. Via this critical discussion a fresh view of how English identity might be considered in relation to England’s victory is offered.