What is Hungary Men's best ever win in March?

Hungary's first-ever match in the month of March came against 1924 Olympic football silver medallists Switzerland in 1925 and Lajos Máriássy's team marked the occasion in style, thrashing their Central European rivals 5-0 at home in MTK Budapest's stadium. The hosts were full of prominent names of the time, including the Fogl brothers, György Orth and seven-time Hungarian league winner György Molnár, who scored a goal in each half after József Takács had opened the scoring. A late brace of goals by Rudolf Jeny, a league and cup double winner with MTK that same season and later player-coach of Sporting Clube de Portugal, ensured a dominant Hungarian display ended as a complete rout.

There were impressive results throughout the 1930s in March, a 2-0 win over Czechoslovakia in 1933 followed by two easy World Cup qualifying victories, 4-1 against Buglaria in 1934 and 11-1 over Greece in 1938, as Hungary remained unbeaten in the third month of the year right up until 1972. None of the intervening draws or wins can count as history's most memorable though, perhaps in part because Ferenc Puskás' Magical Magyars never actually played in the month of March.

Prospective 1978 World Cup hosts and winners Argentina were the visitors to the Népstadion two years earlier in 1976 and they provided the opposition in a superb match for the 25,000 spectators present as first-half goals from Tibor Nyilasi and László Fazekás put Mario Kempes' men to the sword in a dominant performance.

Ten years later, it was against another South American opponent that Hungary played its most famous match in March, against the famous Brazil in the Népstadion. Head coach György Mezey had already moulded his squad into one of the best in Europe but this 3-0 triumph over one of world football's greatest nations sent a message out to everyone that Hungary should be taken seriously ahead of the World Cup that summer. Lajos Détári gave the home team a fifth-minute lead which Kálmán Kovács doubled on the hour mark, Márton Eszterházy completing a much-heralded success in the 73rd minute with Hungary's third goal.

Five years later came Hungary's most recent outstanding result in the month of March when they travelled to Spain and won 4-2 away in Seville. Spain boasted the likes of Andonia Zubizarreta, Guillermo Amor, José María Bakero and Manuel Sanchis but they were overwhlemed by two-goal bursts from striker József Kiprich - then of Feyenoord at club level - and defender Elmi Lőrincz, who was a defender with an average scoring ratio of one in ten throughout his career. Kiprick's first in the 44th minute was cancelled out by a penalty just a minute later but Lőrincz notched his first in the 55th minute and Kiprick took his own tally to two after an hour. Carlos Munoz halved the deficite six minutes from time but Lőrincz made sure of victory with a near-post diving header in the penultimate minute of normal time.

So these are the results with which we should be comparing last week's win, but of course the defeat of Croatia comes with one crucial difference to most of the aforementioned victories; whilst all of the post-war matches in March were frienly fixtures, Marco Rossi's men prevailed over the fourth-highest ranked team in the world in a competitive match with three important qualification points at stake in the race to reach the 2020 UEFA European Championships. Whether, that is enough to elevate it to Hungary's best ever victory in the month of March is of course up for debate, but at the very least it leave all Hungarian football fans feeling positive about the chance to reach a second Euros in a row and this time play finals matches on home soil, in Budapest which is one of the 12 host cities of UEFA Euro 2020.

The full list of Hungary Men's March fixtures over the years:

Date Opponent Result Match status (Fr = friendly, Wcq = World Cup qualifier, Ecq = European Championship qualifier)

25/03/1925 Switzerland (home) 5-0 Fr
25/03/1928 Yugoslavia (home) 2-1 Fr
25/03/1928 Italy (away) 3-4 Int Cup I
22/03/1931 Czech'vakia (away) 3-3 Int Cup II
20/03/1932 Czech'vakia (away) 3-1 Fr
19/03/1933 Czech'vakia (home) 2-0 Fr
05/03/1933 Netherlands (away) 2-1 Fr
25/03/1934 Bulgaria (away) 4-1 Wcq
15/03/1936 Germany (home) 3-2 Fr
25/03/1938 Greece (home) 11-1 Wcq
20/03/1938 Germany (away) 1-1 Fr
19/03/1939 Ireland (away) 2-2 Fr
16/03/1939 France (away) 2-2 Fr
31/03/1940 Switzerland (home) 3-0 Fr
23/03/1941 Yugoslavia (away) 1-1 Fr
20/03/1963 Wales (away) 1-1 Ecq Rd 1
22/03/1967 Algeria (away) 1-0 Algeria Cup Sf
29/03/1972 West Germany (home) 0-2 Fr
31/03/1974 Bulgaria (home) 3-1 Fr
26/03/1975 France (away) 0-2 Fr
27/03/1976 Argentina (home) 2-0 Fr
27/03/1977 Spain (away) 1-1 Fr
15/03/1977 Iran (away) 2-0 Fr
28/03/1979 East Germany (home) 3-0 Fr
26/03/1980 Poland (home) 2-1 Fr
24/03/1982 Austria (home) 2-3 Fr
27/03/1983 Luxembourg (away) 6-2 Ecq
31/03/1984 Yugoslavia (away) 1-2 Fr
16/03/1986 Brazil (home) 3-0 Fr
26/03/1988 Belgium (away) 0-3 Fr
16/03/1988 Turkey (home) 1-0 Fr
08/03/1989 Ireland (home) 0-0 Wcq
28/03/1990 France (home) 1-3 Fr
20/03/1990 USA (home) 2-0 Fr
27/03/1991 Spain (away) 4-2 Fr
25/03/1992 Austria (home) 2-1 Fr
31/03/1993 Greece (home) 0-1 Wcq
10/03/1993 USA (away) 0-0 Kirin Cup
07/03/1993 Japan (away) 1-0 Kirin Cup
23/03/1994 Austria (away) 1-1 Fr
09/03/1994 Switzerland (home) 1-2 Fr
29/03/1995 Switzerland (home) 2-2 Ecq
08/03/1995 Latvia (home) 3-1 Fr
19/03/1997 Malta (away) 4-1 Fr
25/03/1998 Austria (away) 3-2 Fr
31/03/1999 Slovakia (away) 0-0 Ecq
27/03/1999 Liechtenstein (home) 5-0 Ecq
10/03/1999 Bosnia H. (home) 1-1 Fr
29/03/2000 Poland (home) 0-0 Fr
24/03/2001 Lithuania (home) 1-1 Wcq
07/03/2001 Jordan (away) 1-1 Fr
27/03/2002 Moldova (away) 2-0 Fr
29/03/2003 Poland (away) 0-0 Ecq
31/03/2004 Wales (home) 1-2 Fr
30/03/2005 Bulgaria (home) 1-1 Wcq
28/03/2007 Moldova (home) 2-0 Ecq
24/03/2007 Montenegro (away) 1-2 Fr
26/03/2008 Slovenia (home) 0-1 Fr
28/03/2009 Albania (away) 1-0 Wcq
03/03/2010 Russia (home) 1-1 Fr
29/03/2011 Netherlands (away) 3-5 Ecq
25/03/2011 Netherlands (home) 0-4 Ecq
26/03/2013 Turkey (away) 1-1 Wcq
22/03/2013 Romania (home) 2-2 Wcq
05/03/2014 Finland (home) 1-2 Fr
29/03/2015 Greece (home) 0-0 Ecq
26/03/2016 Croatia (home) 1-1 Fr
25/03/2017 Portugal (away) 0-3 Wcq
27/03/2018 Scotland (home) 0-1 Fr
23/03/2018 Kazakhstan (home) 2-3 Fr
24/03/2019 Croatia (home) 2-1 Ecq

(additional info courtesy of www.rsssf.com)