When art mattered more than trophies

The first chapter puts it best The best stories in life are the ones where those involved dont get the girl the happy ending or even the Jules Rimet Trophy Our age with its offputting emphasis on success encourages football teams to play sterile percentage football with celebrated coaches telling their wards to defend and wait for mistakes from the oppositionDenmark coach Sepp Piontek during a training session in 1981 PicGetty ImagesIt wasnt that way with Denmark in the 1980s They went out in the second round of the 1986 World Cup eviscerated 51 by a Spanish side ruthless on the counterattack but had left their mark in the previous three games mdash beating Scotland 10 Uruguay 61 and West Germany 20The Germans would go on to reach the final denied glory only by Diego Maradonas ability to conjure up a pass when boxed in by four opponents All these years later though you remember next to nothing of that German side Denmark are a different story one that has been beautifully told in Danish Dynamite The Story of Footballs Greatest Cult TeamIt is the tale of a team whose players were itinerants long before English Premier League and La Liga riches made football the embodiment of globalisation It is the narrative of a team that changed a culture of defeat within the space of a decade and left behind memories that have lasted far longerIt is also a story of what might have been Before Michael Laudrup came along Allan Simonsen was Denmarks greatest player He remains the only Dane to have won the Ballon dOr In Denmarks opening game at Euro 1984 he broke his leg an injury so severe that it effectively ended his career Denmark reached the semifinals without him losing on penalties to SpainTwo years later in Mexico he got 20 minutes as substitute against the Germans A player who should have been revered as one of the games greatest is almost unknown as a result But the greatest whatif concerns that match against Spain which Denmark led till the stroke of half timeThen Jesper Olsen played a disastrous square ball across his own penalty box Emilio Butrugueno who wasnt nicknamed The Vulture without good reason popped in and applied the finishing touches But Jesper Jesper Jesper thats lethal said Svend Gehrs on Danish TV a sentence that is still summoned up when people look back at that Queretaro afternoon when things fell apartSix years later Denmark did win a trophy The players were on their summer vacations when wartorn Yugoslavia were excluded from Euro 92 The Danes took their place and went all the way beating the Netherlands on penalties in the semifinal before seeing off the Germans to lift the trophy That though was a far less thrilling side The outstanding performer was Peter Schmeichel the Man United goalkeeperFairytaleWhile that triumph is cited as a footballing fairy tale the team itself isnt remembered with the same fondness as the 86 vintage whose fans chanted We are red we are white we are Danish dynamite The reason for that can be found in a famous quote from Danny Blanchflower who won the leagueandcup double with Tottenham in 196061The great fallacy is that the game is first and foremost about winning he said Its nothing of the kind The game is about glory Its about doing things in style with a flourish about going out and beating the other lot not waiting for them to die of boredomFrom their nowiconic Hummel kit to the way they passed and moved at breathtaking speed there was nothing remotely boring about Denmark They stayed true to themselves right up until the end an increasingly rare quality that everyone desires but few actively try to develop says the bookLong after the medals have been handed out and the tournaments have been condensed into a short collection of memories that is the detail that stays with everyone who saw them To the victors went the spoils The glory went to Denmark Sepp Piontek who coached that team for 11 years never won a major trophy Their story however is unforgettableDileep Premachandran is editorinchief of Wisden India