If it is anything like the last global sporting extravaganza held in Russia, next year's FIFA World Cup will be the most political tournament since 1934 when Italian dictator Benito Mussolini presided over the action.

Next year's competition falls on the 60th anniversary of Mother Russia's first appearance at the World Cup finals. In those days, the country was known as the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, or USSR.

They were absent from Olympic and World Cup competitions before the Second World War at the behest of their Government, but it was football which paved the way for a grand re-entry.

The game had actually been introduced to Russia by overseas workers at the turn of the 20th century.

In fact, the Orekhovo-Zuyevo textile mills advertised for engineers, mechanics and clerks who were "capable of playing football well".

A Russian team even took part in the 1912 Stockholm Olympics but they did not progress beyond the first round.

Football survived the Russian Revolution with a twist. In the early 1920s, it was not sufficient simply to win the matches. Teams were also graded with "factors" such as lateness, discipline on the field and sporting conduct.

A match between Moscow and London trade union teams was said to have taken place as early as 1927.

The Muscovites won 20-1 and local newspapers wrote that "the British toilers have had no chance to learn this game. We must teach them".

An authentic national league was established in 1936 and attracted huge crowds. Teams were given names which reflected industry such as Lokomotiv and Dynamo. Others were named Spartak after Spartacus, who led the revolt of slaves in Ancient Rome. Dynamo were the first champions.

The Second World War made it impossible for international contact to be resumed but in November 1945, a Moscow team flew to Britain for a series of challenge matches against leading British clubs.

Dynamo Moscow arrived at Croydon Aerodrome to the south of London in two Dakota aircraft emblazoned with a red star. The tour party of 38 included cinema cameramen, a radio commentator and an interpreter.

The tour had been in doubt until the last minute and seemed briefly to be in further jeopardy when hotel accommodation was not initially available. Officials visited Stanley Rous at the offices of the Football Association to tell him "we must be given proper sleeping arrangements before we can discuss football".

Eventually the team were found rooms at the Imperial Hotel in London's Russell Square.

"We did our best to fix them up," said Rous, who blamed the Soviets for a lack of notice.

The club was described as belonging to the "People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs"’ or N.K.V.D, the forerunner of the KGB.

The players wore long shorts in accordance with the fashion of the time but theirs were trimmed with white, and on their shirts was a large stylized D for Dynamo. They also presented their opponents with bouquets of flowers.

"They are fast, with and without the ball and can shoot both accurately and extraordinarily hard," said Chelsea manager Billy Birrell. Their style of play became known as "Passovotchka".

Officially, 74,496 watched the match at Stamford Bridge although the actual attendance was thought to be much higher.

"Every clever move was cheered to the echo," reports said.

The result was a 3-3 draw for the first Russians in Chelsea, well over 50 years before the arrival of future Blues chief Roman Abramovich.

Dynamo then hammered 10 past Cardiff and returned to London to meet Arsenal, who were bolstered by guest players such as England internationals Stanley Matthews and Stan Mortensen.

"The composition of the English team published today differs considerably from the Arsenal team previously made known," said the Russians.

"In the light of the Russians' performances against Cardiff, it would have been paying them poor compliment to expect them to pit their great skill against our present resources," responded Arsenal manager George Allison.

The match was broadcast live on BBC Radio and also by Radio Moscow who described the Arsenal team as "a combined XI of the professional players of the strongest British football clubs".

The Russians insisted on their own referee, one Nikolai Latyshev, but dense fog made it difficult for officials, players and spectators alike.

Dynamo won 4-3 in the gloom. A further match was arranged in Glasgow where they drew 2-2 with Rangers to complete the tour unbeaten.

"The effect of the tour was the same as that of a cold spray on a sleepy gentleman," wrote Bernard Joy who played against Dynamo for Arsenal.

Even the way the players warmed up offered a lesson. The pre-match session was so energetic that goalkeeper Alexei Tiger Khomich was often covered with mud before the match had even started as a result of diving for low shots during practice.

In the euphoria that followed, there was even talk of a bid for Vsevolod Bobrov and Konstantin Beskov. The fee mentioned for each was £10,000 ($13,000/€11,000), serious money at the time.

Not all shared the goodwill, with George Orwell writing a famous article in Tribune.

"Now that the brief visit of the Dynamo football team has come to an end, it is possible to say publicly what many thinking people were saying privately before the Dynamos ever arrived," he said.

"That sport is an unfailing cause of ill-will, and if such a visit as this had any effect on Anglo-Soviet relations, it could only be to make them slightly worse than before. At least two of the matches led to bad feeling. 

"At international level sport is frankly mimic warfare. I hope therefore that we shan't follow up the visit of the Dynamos by sending a British team to the USSR."

Relations between Russia and the West grew steadily colder over the next few years and it was not until the 1950s that sporting contact became more regular.

A Soviet team team did appear at the Olympics in 1952 in Helsinki. They did not reach the medal round and footballer turned journalist Andrei Starostin wrote witheringly: "The Soviet footballers were lame ducks as far as technique was concerned".

In 1956, they were much better prepared and reached the Olympic final.

Though they needed a replay to beat Indonesia, they defeated fancied Bulgaria after extra-time and in front of 100,000 they beat Yugoslavia 1-0 in the final.

"The eventual gold medallists richly deserved success," said the official report of the Games.

"The Russians proved that they could adapt their game to whatever demands were placed upon them."

It proved to be the start of a golden age for Soviet football. In 1960 they reached the final of the newly created European Nations Cup, later known as the European Championships, and beat Yugoslavia to lift the Henri Delaunay trophy in Paris.

Over the next decade they only failed to reach the final once.

In 1958, the World Cup was held in Sweden, and for the first time, a Russian team took part.

"The team spirit was healthy," said Nikita Simonyan, who skippered the side and scored in their very first World Cup finals tie against England. 

"Even though we had players from Dynamo, Spartak and Torpedo there were no problems. Everyone forgot which club they played for."

Their goalkeeper Lev Yashin was instantly recognisable in his all black uniform, emblazoned with the Cyrillic letters CCCP. 

They lost to eventual champions Brazil in the group stages. Pelé made his tournament debut in that match and although he did not score, he earned the respect of the great goalkeeper. Towards the end of his life, Yashin said that "it was always an honour to be beaten by Pelé". 

The Soviets eventually lost to Sweden in the knock-out stages but reached the quarter finals at the very least in their first four World Cups. 

At the 1962 World Cup in Chile, they took part in a match described in the French newspaper L’Equipe as one of the "greatest surprises in modern football".

They led 3-0 in the first ten minutes against Colombia in a group game in Arica but allowed their opponents back into the match to draw 4-4.

Even so they still qualified for the quarter-finals but lost to the host nation.

Chile and the Soviet Union were drawn together in 1966, and this time the result was reversed. The Soviets reached the last four before losing to West Germany. It remains the best performance by a Soviet or Russian team at the World Cup.

Seven years later Chile again barred the way to World Cup progress, this time in an intercontinental play-off.

The two sides drew the first leg in Moscow 0-0 and a return was scheduled for the National Stadium in Santiago.

In Chile there had been a military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet to depose left wing President Salvador Allende. Many political prisoners were subsequently interned in the stadium.

Moscow sent a message describing the stadium as "an area of torture and the execution of patriots".

FIFA ordered the Soviets to go ahead with the match but although they had apparently obtained agreement for the use of another stadium, this was rebuffed with a terse telegram from the Soviet Football authorities which said: "Match in Chile is impossible". 

"This is the first time that a team has disqualified itself for political reasons," claimed FIFA's Rene Courte.

With no opposition at kick-off time, the Chilean players simply walked forward when the whistle blew to score a "symbolic" goal.

It would not be until 1982 that the Russians would qualify for the tournament's final stages again.

They were effectively knocked out by Poland in a politically charged match. This was the era of the solidarity protests in Gdansk.

The most effective Russian or Soviet team of the modern era was already coming together in the mid 1980s. They certainly looked the part at the 1986 World Cup when they were unlucky to come across an equally vibrant Belgian team in Mexico. Their encounter which finished 4-3 to the Belgians has gone down as one of the true World Cup classics. 

Broadly the same team reached the European Championship final two years later after beating the eventual winners from The Netherlands in the group stages.

Since the break-up of the old Soviet Union, there has been little to write home about. A 6-1 victory over Cameroon in 1994 came when they were already eliminated and they failed to win a single match in Brazil during the 2014 tournament. 

Earlier this month, the Russians tried to invoke the spirit of an earlier age when they asked Nikita Simonyan to help make the draw.

Now 91, he is still an honorary vice president of the National Federation and was in the side which won his nation's first global tournament at the 1956 Olympics. Will his countrymen be celebrating a similar triumph in July? 

If so, it will certainly be with flowers.