Colombia’s first World Cup appearance has largely been forgotten but midfielder Coll wrote his name into history with a moment of improvisation that remains unique to this day

For a nation that has recorded just one knockout-stage victory in World Cup history, Colombia have left a particularly vivid imprint on the tournament. From René Higuita racing several miles from his goal at Italia 90 to James Rodríguez’s goal of the 2014 tournament, via the stomach-churning sight of Andrés Escobar stretching to intercept a cross in Pasadena, Colombia’s contribution to the global game is far greater in Technicolour than on paper.

Long before Faustino Asprilla, Carlos Valderrama and the legendary Birdman lit up our TV screens, Colombia made their debut in a very different era. Their first World Cup trip – and their only qualification until 1990 – was a short one, travelling to Chile in 1962. They were unfancied outsiders after sneaking through a thin South American qualification pool missing both the hosts and defending champions Brazil – but though they didn’t win a game, one player left his mark on World Cup history.

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The 1962 tournament sits in the hinterland between the cricket scores of early tournaments and the colour TV breakthrough that made superstars of Pelé, Bobby Moore and Johan Cruyff over the ensuing 15 years. It is perhaps the last World Cup that bears no real resemblance to the supercharged football festivals of the modern era. Chile had orchestrated a slick PR campaign to win hosting rights from under the noses of neighbouring Argentina, but their plans were torn apart by natural disaster.

The 1960 Valdivia earthquake, still the largest ever recorded, caused damage to several prospective host cities, and government support for the tournament was hastily withdrawn with up to two million citizens affected. Only four venues were used in 1962 – three of those, including a Rancagua facility borrowed from a mining company, were close to the capital.

The other, in the northern outpost Arica, was where Colombia would play all of their games. The debutants, managed by the Argentina legend Adolfo Pedernera but comprised entirely of unheralded, domestic league-based players, were Group 1’s rank outsiders, drawn alongside the former champions Uruguay and two European giants in Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union.

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In one of four opening matches that kicked off simultaneously on 30 May, Colombia took an early lead against Uruguay, the captain Francisco Zuluaga scoring from the spot after 19 minutes, but their opponents rallied in the second half to win 2-1. The next day, the USSR, led by Lev Yashin, widely considered the world’s finest goalkeeper, beat Yugoslavia 2-0 to take control of the group.

In their second game, Colombia lined up against the USSR at the Carlos Dittborn Stadium knowing they had to cause an upset to keep their hopes of progress alive. Things didn’t start well – after 11 minutes, they were 3-0 down and on track for a historic beating. Germán Aceros pulled one back but Viktor Ponedelnik’s goal on 56 minutes appeared to end the game as a contest.

Twelve minutes later Marcos Coll, a diminutive midfielder from Barranquilla, trotted over to take a corner. As Yashin marshalled his defence, Coll was struck by the Soviets’ height advantage, and how little chance he had of picking out a team-mate. An idea came to him. As the “Black Spider” crept off his line, anticipating a routine catch, Coll aimed a quick shot at his near post – and scored.

It remains the only “Olympic goal” – a goal direct from a corner – ever scored at the World Cup. The name derives from a goal scored by Argentina’s Cesário Onzari against Uruguay, the recent Olympic champions in 1924. Onzari took advantage of a new law allowing direct goals from corners, bending the ball into the roof of the net to embarrass their fiercest rivals in Montevideo.

Coll’s effort lacked Onzari’s dramatic execution – his shot floated apologetically inside the near post with the Soviet defence dumbfounded. “There was a huge roar,” Coll recalled years later, “because I had scored against the best goalkeeper in the world.” Not that Yashin looks it in this particular clip. Caught on his heels, he begins apportioning blame before the ball hits the net, with the defender stationed on the near post first to get a talking to.

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With the locals firmly on their side, Colombia poured forward as their opponents struggled to regroup. Antonio Rada toe-poked a cross into the corner just four minutes after Coll’s intervention, before Marino Klinger raced through on goal. Yashin flew off his line, got nowhere near ball or man, and Klinger scored Colombia’s third goal in just eight second-half minutes.

The game ended 4-4 – Colombia’s first World Cup point – but the underdogs still needed to beat Yugoslavia to have any chance of reaching the quarter-finals. This was to be no close-run thing – they lost 5-0 – but Coll’s moment of magic proved terminal to the Soviets’ campaign. “What kind of a goalkeeper is not tormented by the goal he has allowed?” Yashin once pondered – and this goal tormented him more than most.

The USSR topped the group but their keeper’s confidence did not recover, his poor form contributing to a shock quarter-final defeat to the hosts. If Colombia’s World Cup reputation is built on isolated moments of magic, then the USSR’s (and latterly Russia’s) is grounded in perpetual underachievement. Four years later, Yashin led his team to fourth place in England – still the highest World Cup finish by a Russian side. The host nation appear highly unlikely to buck that trend this summer.

As for Coll, he quickly returned to obscurity, playing in his homeland with América de Cali, Deportes Tolima and Atlético Junior. His international career ended in 1962 but the nickname earned in Chile – “El Olimpico” – stuck with him far beyond retirement. His death last June at the age of 81, in his hometown of Barranquila, was headline news across South America.



“For me, it was a joy that God gave me that Olympic goal,” Coll said in 2012. “In fifty years, no other player has repeated it. Without a doubt, that goal immortalised me.” This is undeniably true in Coll’s home country, but his singular if unspectacular moment of improvisation, played out in a far-flung group game 56 years ago, has faded from the global consciousness. If his feat is repeated in Russia, of all places, this summer, it should be renamed “the Marcos”.