Soviet Union national football team

The Soviet Union national football team is the team that represents the country of Soviet Union in international competition and is controlled by Football Federation of the Soviet Union.

History
The first official match that the Soviet Union played (as the Russian Empire) was in the first round of the 1912 Summer Olympics which was held in Sweden. After upsetting Sweden 4-0 in what was an upset of the Olympics. The second round though would see the team lose to Italy to be knocked out. The next tournament that the team would enter was qualifying for the 1914 FIFA World Cup where at home they would lose 2-1 to Chile who was also first time debutants in competing for World Cup.

After the first World War and the Russian Revolution delayed the progression in Russian football, the Soviet Union and wouldn't play their first official match until November 16, 1924, where they took on Turkey. With matches being very limited, it would be true as they didn't qualify to the next two World Cups in 1926 (Spain) and 1930 (Uruguay).

Despite playing unofficial matches against Turkey, the first official tournament that the team played in was the 1952 Summer Olympics. In the opening round, they defeated Bulgaria 4-0. In the first official round, the team was 5-1 behind against Yugoslavia with 15 minutes to go but the team would score five goals in the time with scoring four goals overall and three in that period to get the team through to the quarter-finals. After smashing Poland (4-1) and West Germany (4-2), they would meet Romania in the final where they would take the gold medal after Bobrov scored the winning goal in the 59th minute.

With the new confidence, they would breeze through qualifying to headline Group C with Romania, France and Korea. After two draws in the opening two games, the Soviets would put the foot on Korea with five going passing the net of to record a solid win where  scoring a hat-trick. The quarter-finals would see the end for the debutants with a 1-0 loss to Hungary in the quarter-finals of the competition.

FIFA World Cup
Gold  Silver   Bronze