The World Cup has been stolen. “They threw me to the ground. They dragged me to the elevator”

– When everyone sent in bizarre sketches that had to be imagined and interpreted in different ways, my father simply sent a model made of chalk. The jury could not only see the cup, but also hold it in their hands and see what it was like to take a picture with it. This determined his success – Giorgio Gazzaniga said in an interview with The Athletic.

In 1971, his father – Silvio – won a competition to design a new statuette for the football world champion. FIFA announced the competition after the Brazilians won the World Cup for the third time in history in 1970, thanks to which, in accordance with an earlier agreement, they took ownership of the previous trophy, the Jules Rimet Cup.

The World Cup by Gazzaniga senior is today the most coveted and most important trophy in the world. From 1974, they were built successively by Franz Beckenbauer, Daniel Passarella, Dino Zoff, Diego Maradona, Lothar Matthaeus, Dunga, Didier Deschamps, Cafu, Fabio Cannavaro, Iker Casillas, Philipp Lahm and Hugo Lloris.

On Sunday, the latter will have a chance to become the first player in history to lift the trophy made by Gazzaniga twice in a row. However, he will be met by the Argentines led by Lionel Messi, for whom winning the world title would be more than a childhood dream come true. It would be the completion of his illustrious career, which would probably put an end to discussions about who was the greatest footballer of all time.

The final of the World Cup between France and Argentina will take place on Sunday at 16:00.

The trophy that changed the author’s life

The 18-carat gold statuette, measuring 36 cm and weighing 6.142 kg, changed the lives of Gazzaniga and his family. Although the creator of the world cup passed away a few years ago, his company still works closely with FIFA and UEFA.

Gazzaniga senior designed the trophy awarded to the winners of the UEFA Cup, today known as the Europa League. Italy also created The European Super Cup and the trophy for the winners of the European Under-21 Championship. GDE Bertoni, as the company is called, produces medals for UEFA competitions and even replicas of the Champions League trophy, even though Gazzaniga was not its designer.

The fact that FIFA chose his project was due not only to the clever execution of the world cup project, but also, and perhaps above all, to his experience. Prior to competing in the competition, Gazzaniga worked for a medal and trophy company that worked with the Italian Olympic Committee to host the 1960 Summer Olympic Games in Rome.

– My father had worked in this industry for over 20 years, so he finally wanted to do something different. Something that will truly be remembered for years and generations to come. The Rimet Cup was an expression of secession. The father wanted to present the new spirit of 20th century art, said Giorgio Gazzaniga.

Easy-to-receive cup

The general expression of the cup is created by two figures holding the globe above their heads. However, the statuette has several meanings. “As he was going to create a cup for world champions, it was clear to my father that the center of the statuette had to be the earth,” said Gazzaniga, junior.

And he added: – The two men supporting her are a symbol that football is not a sport for individuality. You will not achieve anything in this discipline by yourself. These people also symbolize the two teams that are fighting for this trophy.

– It is also a symbol of fans watching the game. After all, even in the stands, people raise their hands to the sky. It is a vivid and hard vision of victory. Father wanted to show symbols that would not be abstract. He wanted everyone in the world to be able to interpret his work with ease.

Gazzaniga also did not want his trophy to be static, as that was the previous trophy made by Jules Rimet. While the work of the Frenchman, who was the third FIFA president in history, depicted an immobile figure, the Italian cup was dynamic and showed competition, success and joy.

Gazzaniga’s work was initially supposed to have an “expiry date” until 2030. Therefore, he placed 20 rectangles on the basis of the Italian cup, in which successive world champions were entered. Now the winners are also written on the bottom of the base, which has extended the “shelf life” of the trophy.

Interestingly, since 2006, the world champions have not kept the cup for the next World Cup. The winners only erect the original and then receive a replica of it. The actual trophy is kept at the FIFA headquarters in Zurich on a daily basis, where it is under special protection. All so that it does not share the fate of its predecessor.

The trophy that survived in a shoe box

And these were exceptionally turbulent. The Rimet Cup was created in 1928 by the French sculptor Abel Lafleur. The Parisian was inspired by the ancient Greek sculpture “Winged Victory of Samothrace”, which can still be seen in the Louvre today. The statuette was a centimeter lower than the current one, and it was made of silver covered with gold.

In 1930, the Rimet Cup went from Uruguay to Italy, that is, from the hands of the first to the second world champions. As the Italians also won the World Cup in 1934, the trophy spent World War II with them, during which the Nazis wanted to steal it and take it out of Rome.

They wanted to, but they were outsmarted by the then head of the Italian football association – Ottorino Barassi. The man, sensing a German ruse, took the trophy from the bank vault to his own home, where he hid it under the bed in a shoe box. Although thieves also attacked Barassi’s apartment, they did not find the trophy.

In 1950, the trophy returned to Uruguay, and four years later it went to West Germany, where, according to historians, its fate became very complicated.

Replaced base and stolen cup

In the documentary “The Rimet Cup: The Incredible History of the World Cup”, we learn that the statuette could have been stolen in four years in West Germany. According to historians, the trophy that flew to the tournament in Sweden in 1958 was five centimeters higher than the one won by Germany. The cup was also to have a different base.

Although it has never been proven that the trophy was stolen, the fact remains that the 1954 and 1958 statuettes were different. As it turned out, the original base was definitely replaced (stolen?) and only found in 2014. “It’s like discovering an Egyptian mummy,” said David Ausseil, one of the directors of the world football museum that was being built in Zurich at the time.

While the fate of the Rimet Cup from that time is not exactly known, it is known that the trophy was stolen in 1966. It happened in March, less than four months before the English World Cup, when the statuette was at the Stampex philatelic exhibition in Central Hall in London Westminster.

Three days after the theft, the president of the English federation – Joe Mears – received a ransom note. Sum? 15 thousand pounds. However, the exchange did not take place, because 48 hours later, thanks to a police ambush, it was possible to detain a suspected theft worker – Edward Betchley. However, he stated that he was only hired to collect the ransom and had no idea where the trophy was.

This came a week after the theft in south London. A dog named Pickles found them in the bushes. Its owner – David Corbett – received a prize of approximately 6,000. pounds, and Pickles a year’s supply of food. The dog and its owner were also official guests at the World Cup final, in which England defeated Germany 4-2.

The hosts, however, did not present Corbett and Pickles to FIFA authorities. Until the very end, the English did not reveal that the trophy had been stolen. The case did not come to light until several years later.

The thieves got their way

Four years later, the Rimeta Cup went permanently to Brazil. This happened on the basis of the decision of the Frenchman, who announced much earlier that the country that will be the first to win the world championship three times will be able to keep the trophy. Although in 1970 the Brazilians did it, today they do not have the Rimeta Cup.

All because it was finally stolen in 1983. The trophy was stored at the headquarters of the local football federation in Rio de Janeiro. Although the statuette was behind bulletproof glass, thieves had no problems stealing it due to the wooden frame.

– I couldn’t see anything because they threw me to the ground, blindfolded me and dragged me to the elevator – said the guard who was the only person in the union’s headquarters on the ill-fated night of 18/19 December. The trophy has not been found to this day, and there are a lot of conspiracy theories about its theft.

One of them is that the trophy was stolen by the Argentines, the biggest rivals of the Brazilians. They were supposed to melt the cup into gold bars, which seems less likely due to the material from which it was made.

The only place to watch the Rimet Cup today is the Manchester Football Museum. There is a replica made in 1966 by the English goldsmith – George Bird. The trophy was put up for auction in 1995, shortly after the man’s death.

His family hoped to earn between 20,000 and 30,000 on the work. pounds. In the end, she received 250,000. pounds. The statuette was auctioned by FIFA, which was concerned that it was an original work that the English might want to keep after their historic success at the World Cup organized in their country. Only detailed research showed that it was a replica that can be seen to this day.