A weekend of world club football is coming to Tolworth next summer, and Corinthian-Casuals have a title to defend as we host the Egri Erbstein Tournament at the United Business Group Stadium on the weekend of 23-24 July.
James Bracken’s side travelled to Budapest for the inaugural edition of the competition in 2019, along with dozens of loyal Casuals fans, and brought the trophy home with us. Now we have the chance to defend our title on home soil against three clubs of enormous historic prestige.
Last month, Sheffield FC accepted our invitation to complete the four-team line-up for next summer’s event. The world’s oldest football club will join the hosts of the first tournament, Budapesti Atlétikai Klub (better known as BAK), as well the historic American club Fall River Marksmen.
The tournament will take place over a single weekend and consists of two semi-final ties, to be played on Saturday 23 July, followed by a third-place playoff and the final the following day.
The tournament was dreamt up by representatives of BAK and Corinthian-Casuals and celebrates the transcendental power of football to cross borders and unite people from all backgrounds around a shared sporting ethos and the noble traditions of fair-play, which are still recognised today as ‘The Corinthian Spirit’. Most importantly, the tournament honours the life and legacy of a forgotten footballing great, Ernő Egri Erbstein.
Erbstein played most of his career for BAK, but it was when he moved to Italy to become a manager that he made his name as one of the 20th Century’s most innovative football minds. He was praised for introducing modern scouting methods, for his focus on technique, fitness and dietary requirements, as well as his tactics and motivational speeches on matchdays. Most of all he was celebrated for his humanity. His players loved him.
He was also a Holocaust survivor, and after escaping a labour camp during the last few months of the Second World War, he returned to Italy where he gained fame as the architect of the legendary ‘Grande Torino’ side that won Serie A five times in a row in the 1940s. That team is still considered by many to have been the greatest Italian club side of all-time. Devastatingly, they are remembered as much as anything for the tragedy that ended their glorious period of success, as the entire team – including Egri Erbstein – lost their lives in the Superga air disaster in May 1949.
To ensure that this great football pioneer’s name will never be forgotten, BAK president Bertalan Molnar and his fellow club directors teamed up with Dominic Bliss, author of Erbstein’s biography, to create a tournament in his name. Bliss, also a committee member at Corinthian-Casuals, then discovered that the London club had a strong connection to Hungarian football. Both Corinthians and Casuals had toured Budapest in their pre-merger days and, crucially, presented the Corinthian Cup to the local football clubs in 1905 to help drive the growth of the game forward in Hungary. To honour their predecessors, the modern-day Corinthian-Casuals decided to bring a new Corinthian Cup to be presented to the winners of the inaugural Egri Erbstein Tournament in Budapest in 2019.
It just so happened that the Casuals emerged victorious after defeating Hungarian fourth-tier side Testveriseg 1-0 in the final. “It’s not often something like this comes along for a non-league club, so it was a great experience,” said James Bracken after becoming the first manager to get his hands on the new Corinthian Cup. “There are managers in the game who have done far more than I ever will, but maybe they’ve never taken a team to another country and won anything. To go and win it, to get a trophy, is always something you appreciate.”
Next July, the players of Sheffield FC, Fall River Marksmen, BAK and Corinthian-Casuals will all be hoping to experience something similar here in Tolworth, and it’s a mouth-watering prospect for the organisers.
“We are so pleased with the line-up for the 2022 tournament,” said Bliss. “Egri Erbstein respected tradition but he also believed in progressive values and I think these clubs reflect that combination perfectly.
“To complete the line-up with the world's oldest football club, Sheffield FC, along with a great name from the first golden era of the game in America, in Fall River Marksmen, is fantastic.
“Then it will be really quite special to see Corinthian-Casuals – the current holders, with their great heritage – welcome the original hosts, BAK, to London for the second edition of the tournament. I honestly can’t wait.”
More details will follow over the coming months, so be sure to follow the Egri Erbstein Tournament on Facebook and Twitter or check out the website at egrierbstein.org for the latest news and developments.
James Bracken’s side travelled to Budapest for the inaugural edition of the competition in 2019, along with dozens of loyal Casuals fans, and brought the trophy home with us. Now we have the chance to defend our title on home soil against three clubs of enormous historic prestige.
Last month, Sheffield FC accepted our invitation to complete the four-team line-up for next summer’s event. The world’s oldest football club will join the hosts of the first tournament, Budapesti Atlétikai Klub (better known as BAK), as well the historic American club Fall River Marksmen.
The tournament will take place over a single weekend and consists of two semi-final ties, to be played on Saturday 23 July, followed by a third-place playoff and the final the following day.
The tournament was dreamt up by representatives of BAK and Corinthian-Casuals and celebrates the transcendental power of football to cross borders and unite people from all backgrounds around a shared sporting ethos and the noble traditions of fair-play, which are still recognised today as ‘The Corinthian Spirit’. Most importantly, the tournament honours the life and legacy of a forgotten footballing great, Ernő Egri Erbstein.
Erbstein played most of his career for BAK, but it was when he moved to Italy to become a manager that he made his name as one of the 20th Century’s most innovative football minds. He was praised for introducing modern scouting methods, for his focus on technique, fitness and dietary requirements, as well as his tactics and motivational speeches on matchdays. Most of all he was celebrated for his humanity. His players loved him.
He was also a Holocaust survivor, and after escaping a labour camp during the last few months of the Second World War, he returned to Italy where he gained fame as the architect of the legendary ‘Grande Torino’ side that won Serie A five times in a row in the 1940s. That team is still considered by many to have been the greatest Italian club side of all-time. Devastatingly, they are remembered as much as anything for the tragedy that ended their glorious period of success, as the entire team – including Egri Erbstein – lost their lives in the Superga air disaster in May 1949.
To ensure that this great football pioneer’s name will never be forgotten, BAK president Bertalan Molnar and his fellow club directors teamed up with Dominic Bliss, author of Erbstein’s biography, to create a tournament in his name. Bliss, also a committee member at Corinthian-Casuals, then discovered that the London club had a strong connection to Hungarian football. Both Corinthians and Casuals had toured Budapest in their pre-merger days and, crucially, presented the Corinthian Cup to the local football clubs in 1905 to help drive the growth of the game forward in Hungary. To honour their predecessors, the modern-day Corinthian-Casuals decided to bring a new Corinthian Cup to be presented to the winners of the inaugural Egri Erbstein Tournament in Budapest in 2019.
It just so happened that the Casuals emerged victorious after defeating Hungarian fourth-tier side Testveriseg 1-0 in the final. “It’s not often something like this comes along for a non-league club, so it was a great experience,” said James Bracken after becoming the first manager to get his hands on the new Corinthian Cup. “There are managers in the game who have done far more than I ever will, but maybe they’ve never taken a team to another country and won anything. To go and win it, to get a trophy, is always something you appreciate.”
Next July, the players of Sheffield FC, Fall River Marksmen, BAK and Corinthian-Casuals will all be hoping to experience something similar here in Tolworth, and it’s a mouth-watering prospect for the organisers.
“We are so pleased with the line-up for the 2022 tournament,” said Bliss. “Egri Erbstein respected tradition but he also believed in progressive values and I think these clubs reflect that combination perfectly.
“To complete the line-up with the world's oldest football club, Sheffield FC, along with a great name from the first golden era of the game in America, in Fall River Marksmen, is fantastic.
“Then it will be really quite special to see Corinthian-Casuals – the current holders, with their great heritage – welcome the original hosts, BAK, to London for the second edition of the tournament. I honestly can’t wait.”
More details will follow over the coming months, so be sure to follow the Egri Erbstein Tournament on Facebook and Twitter or check out the website at egrierbstein.org for the latest news and developments.