Soccernostalgia Podcast Part 1 - Mexico, Bolivia & Belgium

@WC1930blogger

This is part one of a three-part podcast I did with Shahan Petrossian from the Soccernostalgia blog on the subject of the first World Cup. In order to make this interview as different as possible from the podcast with the Yesteryear Footy Pod, we had agreed upon a different format where we discuss each of the individual teams in the order in which they finished in the rankings i.e. from 13th to 1st. This would me allow to include topics not discussed in the previous aforementioned podcast. In part one we discuss Mexico, Bolivia and Belgium.

Summary

Beginning with Mexico we discuss the teams' long travel itinerary, anecdotal evidence with regard to the limited education of some of the players and their training regime on board the SS Munargo. Other items include the low expectations of this very young team and of the motivating tactics of their coach Juan Luque Serralonga. There is also a brief focus of one of Mexico's star players, Juan Carreno, and his on and off the field antics. We then review Mexico's matches against France (which include the 1st World Cup goal); Chile (1st World Cup own goal) and Argentina, a game in which there are some discrepancies on how many penalties were actually awarded. 

Moving on to Bolivia we discuss the general lack of information that has been published on this team. And how only recently has new information come to light on their pre-World Cup preparations and journey to Montevideo which coincided with an ongoing coup in the Andean nation. We then take a closer look at Ulises Saucedo, the coach and World Cup referee and his possible connection to Arsenal. We then discuss the reasons why Bolivian players wore letters on their shirts which spelt out 'VIVA URUGUAY' before moving on to their matches against Yugoslavia and Brazil.

We then conclude with Belgium and their journey to Montevideo and how much of what we know comes from the accounts given by the Belgian ref, John Langenus and goalkeeper, Arnold Badjou. Despite their training regime on board the SS Conte Verde some of the players gained weight. We also look at Belgium's selection issues, especially with regard to their star man, Raymond Braine, and how this left them lacking in their attack and as we discuss their defeats against the United States and Paraguay, this affected their ability to be potent in front of goal.