This Week in Football History: Real Madrid, Kings of Europe

The great Di Stefano won five European Cups

Today Adrian North takes us back to the beginning of an incredible eight-year long record set by the brilliant Real Madrid side of the 1950s and 60s... 

February 17, 1957 - Real Madrid 1-0 Deportivo La Coruna, Estadio Santiago Bernabeu

Football is full of seemingly unbreakable records:  

AC Milan's 58 games in a row without defeat remains unbeaten in Europe's 'top leagues' and FC Steaua Bucharest's 104 unbeaten between 1986-89 is the world record. Celtic hold the record for the most points accumulated in a single season with 103 in 01/02. In the Premier League it's hard to see someone beating Chelsea's record of 15 goals conceded in 04/05 and on the international stage Australia's 31-0 against American Samoa back in 2001 may well stand the test of time.  

On the individual front we have: Messi's 91 goals in a calendar year. Dixie Dean's 60 goals in an English first division season. Just Fontaine's 13 goals at a single World Cup. Rogerio Ceni's 124 goals and counting will likely never be broken by another goalkeeper and nobody in a top-flight division will ever play until 50 years old as Stanley Matthews did.   

And while everything I have just listed I find completely mind-blowing in its own right there are two records that blow all those out of the water.      

On April 2, 2011 Sporting Gijon beat Real Madrid 1-0 at the Bernabeu. This ended a record held by Jose Mourinho that stretched back to 2002. For the first time in nine years, and after 150 matches with four different clubs a team coached by Mourinho lost in the league at home. In those nine years nobody, not Sir Alex, Carlo Ancelotti, Rafa Benitez, or any of the 104 other coaches managed to beat Mourinho at his home stadium.   

The fact he maintained this record with Porto (W36, D2), Chelsea (W46, D14), Inter (W29, D9) and Real Madrid (W14) is entirely absurd.   

But perhaps the nomadic nature of Jose Mourinho made it somewhat easier to keep up such a record. Had he stayed at Chelsea since 2004 it's near impossible to see him keeping them unbeaten at home for nine straight years.  

And where Mourinho's 150 unbeaten at home will most probably never be bettered by an individual it is Real Madrid's 121 unbeaten at the Bernabeu between 1957-65 that remains as the most incredulous of team records.   

The 50s of course saw Real Madrid as the unparalleled and unrivaled force in world football. And their five European Cups in a row between '56-'60 is yet another record that will seemingly last throughout my lifetime at least.  

Alfredo Di Stefano, Ferenc Puskas, Francisco Gento, Miguel Munoz - The original Galacticos were the most dominant side European football has ever seen. Between 1953 and 1965 Madrid won nine out of 12 La Liga titles with either Di Stefano or Puskas taking the golden boot in ten of those years.  

But on February 17, 1957 Madrid beat Deportivo La Coruna 1-0 at the Bernabeu thanks to goal from Enrique Mateos. They then didn't lose another game at home until March 7, 1965 when rivals Atletico scrapped out a 1-0 win - Eight years, 18 days, and 121 games between home defeats.   

By 1965 Real Madrid had largely been replaced as the kings of European football by Eusebio's Benfica and both sides of the city of Milan. But back in Spain, despite being beaten to the league title in '59 and '60 by Barcelona, and in the face of losing Di Stefano in '64 and Puskas in '66 Real Madrid, for the most part, were untouchable as the superstars of Spanish football during the 60s.