1919-1921 – Rebuilding
The Great War was over, but trouble didn’t stop there. Although communication with FIFA was re-established all over the world, there were numerous issues. First, Daniel Burley Woolfall, the president of FIFA, had died peacefully in his home in Blackburn on 24 October 1918. Carl Anton Wilhelm Hirschman, banker, co-founder of the Dutch Olympic Committee and FIFA, previously vice-president under Woolfall, had been made interim president of the organisation. He moved FIFA from its hotel home to his offices in Amsterdam in 1915, and assumed operations there. FIFA operated out of his finances, and he almost single-handedly kept the federation alive.
Hirschman quickly convened an assembly in Brussels in 1919, where many associations were present, while others communicated via telegram. In the meeting, they discussed how to deal with their issues going forward, whether or not they should hold continental championships and the World Cup in the coming years, and how to get over their financial troubles. Tensions were rising in Europe and even a few wars had broken out, not to mention the ongoing Russian Civil War involving a few FIFA member associations. It had gotten so bad that nearly all British associations (England, Scotland, Wales, Isle of Man, Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, and Cornwall) threatened to secede and run their own international federation with the rest of the British Empire if the Central Powers associations were not kicked out of FIFA. Ireland, Leinster and Munster were not present due to the ongoing Irish War of Independence.
The geopolitical situation in Europe had radically changed, and many associations had undergone name changes or had suddenly become cross-border between hostile states. Other regional associations suddenly changed and became part of other countries. This led to a few changes: Galicia-Lodomeria changed its name to Halychyna to avoid confusion with Galicia, and now the association was split between the newly formed Poland and West Ukrainian People’s Republic. Carniola changed its name to Slovenia. Austria and Hungary now covered far less land. Montenegro, Serbia, Croatia-Slavonia and Carniola had merged to form Yugoslavia. The Austrian Silesia was split into Czech and Polish Silesia. And things were changing at an increasingly rapid rate, with many new countries forming out of old ones.
The rest of the world was much more peaceful following the war, and had remained mostly the same. FIFA did note the creation of CONMEBOL and CONACACAF, and encouraged other zones to do the same to help with organising continental tournaments and qualifiers, and to lighten FIFA’s massive workload. Near the end of the meeting, FIFA decided to become the sole regulator of Europe and Africa, while Australasia and Asia would found their own confederations: the
Pacific Association Football Confederation or PAFC and the
Football Confederation of Asia or FCA.
The final decision made during the meeting was whether or not to continue operations as normal: most European associations were unavailable due to ongoing conflicts and/or a severe lack of players. This also affected a few other associations all over the world, like Canada and the Indians. To the chagrin of CONMEBOL and CONACACAF, all official FIFA operations would be suspended until 1921, which was when the qualifiers for the 1922 Denmark World Cup would begin.
In the lead-up to the qualifiers, FIFA would get another massive intake to cover all associations founded between 1913 and 1921:
- Acre
- Afghanistan
- Baden
- Baluchistan
- Bavaria
- Bolivia
- Brittany
- Burma
- Ceará
- Corsica
- Costa Rica
- Danzig
- Dutch East Indies
- East Prussia
- Ecuador
- El Salvador
- Espírito Santo
- Estonia
- French India
- Gascony
- Hesse
- Honduras
- Irish Free State
- Korea
- Latvia
- Liechtenstein
- Lithuania
- Lower Silesia
- Maranhão
- Minas Gerais
- Monaco
- Mozambique
- Negeri Sembilan
- New Guinea
- Normandy
- Oldenburg
- Pahang
- Paraná
- Perak
- Pernambuco
- Peru
- Piauí
- Pomerania
- Portuguese India
- Provence
- Rhineland
- Rio Grande do Norte
- Rio Grande do Sul
- Saarland
- Saxony
- Schleswig-Holstein
- Selangor
- Sergipe
- Slovakia
- Subcarpathia
- Sudetenland
- Surinam
- Thuringia
- Uganda
- Venezuela
- Württemberg
- Zanzibar
Also included was an organisation known as Amikejo, founded in the former territory of Neutral Moresnet by Esperanto speakers of the tri-border region between Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany. Esperanto had become widespread in the area to bridge the gap between the groups and especially in the areas annexed by Belgium and the Netherlands from Germany after the Great War.
The final inclusions were of the Eretz Israel and the Mandatory Palestine football associations. The Eretz Israel association was accepted into FIFA bearing the Mandatory Palestine name with the support of the Maccabi World Union. The Palestine Arabs who were part of the association were angered by a purely Jewish team representing a mostly Arab region, so they split off and formed their own Palestinian Football Association. With some help from the British government mediating the issue, the teams were properly accepted as split and the Mandatory Palestine name was given to the Arabs, while the Jewish team changed its name to Eretz Israel.