England W

Early years

The England men's national football team is the joint-oldest in the world; it was formed at the same time as Scotland. A representative match between England and Scotland was played on 5 March 1870, having been organised by the Football Association. A return fixture was organised by representatives of Scottish football teams on 30 November 1872. This match, played at Hamilton Crescent in Scotland, is viewed as the first official international football match, because the two teams were independently selected and operated, rather than being the work of a single football association. Over the next 40 years, England played exclusively with the other three Home Nations—Scotland, Wales and Ireland—in the British Home Championship.

At first, England had no permanent home stadium. They joined FIFA in 1906 and played their first games against countries other than the Home Nations on a tour of Central Europe in 1908. Wembley Stadium was opened in 1923 and became their home ground. The relationship between England and FIFA became strained, and this resulted in their departure from FIFA in 1928, before they rejoined in 1946. As a result, they did not compete in a World Cup until 1950, in which they were beaten 1–0 by the United States, failing to get past the first round in one of the most embarrassing defeats in the team's history.

Their first defeat on home soil to a foreign team was a 2–0 loss to Ireland, on 21 September 1949 at Goodison Park. A 6–3 loss in 1953 to Hungary was their second defeat by a foreign team at Wembley. In the return match in Budapest, Hungary won 7–1. This stands as England's largest ever defeat. After the game, a bewildered Syd Owen said, "it was like playing men from outer space". In the 1954 FIFA World Cup, England reached the quarter-finals for the first time, and lost 4–2 to reigning champions Uruguay.

Walter Winterbottom and Alf Ramsey

Although Walter Winterbottom was appointed as England's first full-time manager in 1946, the team was still picked by a committee until Alf Ramsey took over in 1963. The 1966 World Cup was hosted in England and Ramsey guided England to victory with a 4–2 win against West Germany after extra time in the final, during which Geoff Hurst scored a hat-trick. At UEFA Euro 1968 in Italy, the team reached the semi-finals for the first time, being eliminated by Yugoslavia.

England qualified automatically for the 1970 World Cup in Mexico as reigning champions, and reached the quarter-finals, where they were knocked out by West Germany. England had been 2–0 up, but were eventually beaten 3–2 after extra time. They then failed to qualify for Euro 1972 and the 1974 World Cup, leading to Ramsey's dismissal by the FA.

Don Revie, Ron Greenwood and Bobby Robson

Following Ramsey's dismissal, Joe Mercer took immediate temporary charge of England for a seven-match spell until Don Revie was appointed as new permanent manager in 1974. Under Revie, the team underperformed and failed to qualify for either Euro 1976 or the 1978 World Cup. Revie resigned in 1977 and was replaced by Ron Greenwood, under whom performances improved. The team qualified for Euro 1980 without losing any of their games, but exited in the group stage of the final tournament in Italy. They also qualified for the 1982 World Cup in Spain; despite not losing a game, they were eliminated at the second group stage.

Bobby Robson managed England from 1982 to 1990. Although the team failed to qualify for Euro 1984, they reached the quarter-finals of the 1986 World Cup, losing 2–1 to Argentina in a game made famous by two highly contrasting goals scored by Diego Maradona – the first being blatantly knocked in by his hand, prompting his "Hand of God" remark, the second being an outstandingly skilful individual goal, involving high speed dribbling past several opponents. England striker Gary Lineker finished as the tournament's top scorer with six goals.

England went on to lose every match at Euro 1988. They next achieved their second best result in the 1990 World Cup by finishing fourth – losing again to West Germany after a closely contested semi-final finishing 1–1 after extra time, then 3–4 in England's first penalty shoot-out. Despite losing to Italy in the match for third place, the members of the England team were given bronze medals identical to the Italians'. Due to the team's good performance at the tournament against general expectations, and the emotional nature of the narrow defeat to West Germany, the team were welcomed home as heroes and thousands of people lined the streets for an open-top bus parade.

Graham Taylor, Terry Venables, Glenn Hoddle and Kevin Keegan

The 1990s saw four England managers follow Robson, each in the role for a relatively brief period. Graham Taylor was Robson's immediate successor. England failed to win any matches at Euro 1992, drawing with tournament winners Denmark and later with France, before being eliminated by host nation Sweden. The team then failed to qualify for the 1994 World Cup after losing a controversial game against the Netherlands in Rotterdam, which resulted in Taylor's resignation. Taylor faced much newspaper criticism during his tenure for his tactics and team selections.