It has grown to possibly the biggest game on earth but what is football's origins and history. Read on to learn more.
Since time immemorial mankind has played various ball games. Evidence of which can be seen in many ancient societies, ancient Greek society being an example. The beginnings of the modern game however began in Britain in the times leading up to the industrial revolution. Whole villages would band together against other villages in games, which would span several fields. These games were often violent and there wasn’t any particular restrictions on which body parts you could use.
Variances of such games continued for some time until the 19th century. More and more people were leaving their villages for the industry of towns. People were feeling pride and allegiances to their fast growing towns and soon people wanted to represent their own towns in competition with the other new fast growing towns around them. Soon games where-by you could only use your feet were being played in stadiums between the burgeoning settlements. At this stage in history there were no crossbars on the goals, only a piece of flimsy tape adjoining two poles. Other differences included, as you might suspect, no use of goalie gloves but also importantly no offside rule, the absence of such a ruling meaning strong attack bias with games frequently ending 10 a piece or greater.
More and more towns created their own football teams and by the beginning of the 20th century the structure of how football is contested today with leagues and cups were in place. Also around this time the game was beginning to be exported around the globe with teams beginning in countries like Germany and Italy around this time. International bouts were beginning, at this point England remaining supreme defeating the likes of the rest of the world on its own. With this international popularity it wasn’t long before the game was being contested on the world stage in the likes of the World Cup or European Championships.
Tactically the game was changing too, with the advent of the offside rule out went 5 strikers and in came more defensive approaches, teams such as Italy trailblazing such approaches to the game. England was losing its supremacy and by the 50's Spanish and Italian club teams as well as South American international teams in particular had risen to an equal footing.
The game since has steadily grown in popularity around the globe, this popularity attracting wealth making former small town sports clubs into multinational plcs. With this greater professionalism has been introduced into the game with better use of nutrition and exercise as well as strict controls on player’s lifestyles. The use of emerging technologies and assistance from the likes of sports psychologists are all being used taking the game to new highs. The future of the sport definitely looks rosy.
Written By: Jack Summers
