# Швеция 7-1 Куба: Последняя остановка темной лошадки Карибского моря
I first heard about Cuba's 1938 World Cup team in a dusty second-hand bookshop in Bologna, of all places. The owner, a retired schoolteacher named Enzo who chain-drank espresso at a rate that would terrify most cardiologists, had a small section on f
Опубликовано: June 6, 2026
Sweden 7-1 Cuba: The Last Stop for the Caribbean Dark Horse
1958. Sweden. World Cup quarterfinals. Sweden vs. Cuba. How did Cuba make it to the World Cup quarterfinals? They were made up of a group of amateur players, training on sandy pitches in the streets of Havana. In the first round, they pulled off a stunning upset against Romania—a European team—and miraculously advanced to the knockout stage.
But the miracle came to a halt in the quarterfinals. The hosts, Sweden—the team boasting the Gre-No-Li trio—gave Cuba no chance. 7-1. Sweden's attacking firepower was overwhelming; they would go on to finish as runners-up in that World Cup, losing at home to a 17-year-old Brazilian kid named Pelé. Cuba's World Cup journey was over, but their quarterfinal record has stood to this day—no team from the Caribbean has ever gone further in the World Cup. Over sixty years later, Cuba can still say: "We once reached the World Cup quarterfinals." And that statement came at the cost of a crushing 7-1 defeat.