I think there are a few teams that probably deserved to win the World Cup. I would say though that the Netherlands in 1974 is probably the best team ever to win it. I will first go through some honourable mentions. Actually in fact I can’t decide between the Netherlands in 1974 and Hungary in 1954. Both teams were spectacular and each deserves to have been put in the history books as winners.
In 1974 the Netherlands had developed their total football system and it was completely brilliant. Cruyff led the team and they got all the way to the final. It seemed they could cruise past West Germany as before “Die Mannschaft” had even touched the ball Cruyff went down and won a penalty in the 3rd minute. It was put away but the Germans managed to overturn the game. They did this by their aggressive man-marking. Since total football relied on space and change of position West Germany watched each Dutch player immensely not allowing them any space. Furthermore, the defence led by Franz Beckenbauer would always be hard to break. 20 years prior West Germany also denied Hungary’s golden generation a Jules Rimet trophy. Over the last four years, Hungary had dominated international football and I think they were unbeaten for a long period of time. In the group stage, the Hungarians battered West Germany 8–3 and when Hungary were 2–0 in the final it looked like it would be a similar result. However, West Germany managed to turn the game around and so it was dubbed “Das wonder von Bern”. There is a German film with that same title and their recreation of that game is incredible. I watched it for our German class and I strongly recommend you watch it as well.