When game almost caused a war on Continent
Jimmy Hogan | 06/02/1935

Memories stirred within me a few days ago when I read that Mr. W. J. Lewington, the referee, was surprised to find six coach-loads of soldiers with carbines at a recent match between Spain and France in Madrid. 

Apparently the reason became obvious when the crowd, excited to fever heat, invaded the pitch after Spain scored a goal. 

Relatively, Continental football is quite mild nowadays, though it is only two years since I myself was arrested and escorted off a football pitch. 

I can recall, however, many incidents far more serious. There was the case of a player's injury which nearly caused a war. 

He was the greatest player Hungary ever had, György Orth, of the M.T.K., Budapest. His injury occurred in an important match at Vienna, and proved to be very serious 

Budapest in uproar.

When Orth returned to Budapest some days later, the population were massed round the railway station, and as Orth's stretcher was conveyed to the waiting ambulance, through walls of people in tears, a sudden, vengeful cry arose, "Down with Austria!" Someone else cried, "War with Austria!" 

That cry was taken up on all sides, and it continued for several days in Budapest, and I believe that the question of Orth's injury was seriously discussed by the Hungarian Parliament.