Magazine - Website Video Exercises - Exercise Database Exercise Editor - Player Tracking System and More
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
subscribe to The complete soccer coaching experience SOCCERCOACHING International The complete soccer coaching experience Magazine - Website Video exercises - Exercise database Exercise editor - Player Tracking System and more ... WWW.SOCCERCOACHINGINTERNATIONAL.COM HISTORY OF ASSOCIATION FOOTBALL The history of association football, which is usually known simply as football, can be traced to traditional football games played in Europe, particularly Medieval England, in ancient times. The modern game has its roots in the formation of the The Football Association (FA) in England in 1863. Several clubs met in London, to create a National code, that would allow clubs to play each other without dispute. At the time, football clubs all played by their own, individual codes of rules, and game-day rules had to be agreed upon before they could play one another. The FA code was immediate, as sport was still very much an amateur activity. The first professional clubs were formed Ebenezer Cobb Morley, who is after working class people took up the sport, and regarded as the "father of football" entrepreneurs saw an opportunity to make money from spectators coming to see star players. Once professionalism took hold and Football became a Working Man's Game, The popularity of the game became immense and was soon spread throughout the world by British expatriates. THE FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION During the early 1860s, there were increasing attempts in England to unify and reconcile the various football games that were played in the public school of England as well in the Industrial North with the Sheffield Rules. In 1862. J. C. Thring, who had been one of the driving forces behind the original Cambridge Rules, was a master at Uppingham School and he issued his own rules of what he called "The Simplest Game" (these are also known as the Uppingham Rules). In early October 1863, another new revised version of the Cambridge Rules was drawn up by a seven member committee representing former pupils from Harrow, Shrewsbury, Eton, Rugby, Marlborough and Westminster. Ebenezer Cobb Morley, a solicitor from Hull, wrote to Bell's Life newspaper in 1863, proposing a governing body for football. Morley was to become the FA's first secretary (1863-6) and its second president (1867-74), but is particularly remembered as it was he who drafted the first Laws of the Game at his home in Barnes, London, that are today played the world over. For this, he is considered not just the father of the Football Association, but of Association Football itself. On the evening of October 26, 1863, representatives of several football clubs in the Greater London area met at the Freemason's Tavern on Long Acre in Covent Garden. This was the first meeting of The Football Association (FA). It was the world's first official football body and for this reason is not preceded with the word English. Charterhouse was the only school which accepted invitations to attend. The first meeting resulted in the issuing of a request for representatives of the public schools to join the association. With the exception of Thring at Uppingham, most schools declined. In total, six meetings of the FA were held between October and December 1863. Committee member J. F. Alcock, said: "The Cambridge Rules appear to be the most desirable for the Association to adopt." After the third meeting, a draft set of rules were published by the FA. However, at the beginning of the fourth meeting, attention was drawn to the recently-published Cambridge Rules of 1863. The Cambridge rules differed from the draft FA rules in two significant areas; namely running with (carrying) the ball and hacking (kicking opposing players in the shins). The two contentious FA rules were as follows: IX. A player shall be entitled to run with the ball towards his adversaries' goal if he makes a fair catch, or catches the ball on the first bound; but in case of a fair catch, if he makes his mark he shall not run. X. If any player shall run with the ball towards his adversaries' goal, any player on the opposite side shall be at liberty to charge, hold, trip or hack him, or to wrest the ball from him, but no player shall be held and hacked at the same time. At the fifth meeting a motion was proposed that these two rules be removed from the FA rules. Most of the delegates supported this suggestion but F. W. Campbell, the representative from Blackheath and the first FA treasurer, objected strongly. He said, "hacking is the true football". The motion was carried nonetheless and — at the final meeting — Campbell withdrew his club from the FA. After the final meeting on 8 December the FA published the "Laws of Football", the first comprehensive set of rules for the game later known as association football. The game also came to be called "soccer" as a shortening of "Association" around the same time as Rugby football, colloquially referred to as "rugger", was developing as the main carrying of the ball version of English football, and "soccer" remains a common descriptor in countries with other prominent football codes today. These first FA rules still contained elements that are no longer part of Association football, but which are still recognisable in other games (Rugby Union, Australian rules football): for instance, a player could make a fair catch and claim a mark, which entitled him to a free kick, and; if a player touched the ball behind the opponents' goal line, his side was entitled to a free kick at goal, from 15 yards in front of the goal line. The laws of the game agreed on by the FA members stipulated a maximum length and breadth for the pitch, the procedure for kicking off, and definition of terms, including goal, throw in, offside. Passing the ball by hand was still permitted provided the ball was caught "fairly or on the first bounce". Despite the specifications of footwear having no "tough nails, iron plates and gutta percha" there were no specific rule on number of players, penalties, foul play or the shape of the ball, captains of the participating teams were expected to agree on these things prior to the match. FOUNDATIONS OF A COMPETITION The laws laid down by the FA had an immediate effect, with Sheffield and Nottingham (now Notts County) playing an annual fixture on the FA code among others. Over the next two years Chesterfield and Stoke joined the code, which meant that the codified form was no longer an exclusive sport of public schools. By this time teams had settled into 11 players each, and the game was played with round balls. It previously stated that all players in front of the ball were offside, eliminating passing of the ball forwards, much like in rugby today. The rule was relaxed. A Sheffield against London game in 1866 had allowed the FA to observe how the rules were affecting the game; subsequently handling of the ball was abolished except for one player on each team, the goalkeeper. A red tape was added between the two goalposts to indicate the top of the goal, and a national competition was proposed. THE FIRST FA CUP On July 20, 1871, C. W. Alcock, a gentleman from Sunderland and a former pupil of Harrow School proposed that "a Challenge Cup should be established in connection with the [Football] Association", the idea that gave birth to the competition. At the first FA Cup in 1872, Wanderers and Royal Engineers met in the final in front of 2,000 paying spectators. Despite the Royal Engineers being the heavy favourites, one of their players sustained a broken collar bone early on and since substitutions had not yet been introduced, the Engineers played a man down for the rest of the match which they eventually lost 1-0. The FA Cup was a success and within a few years all of the clubs in England wanted to take part. To do so they had to accept the FA code, which led to the quick spread of a universal set of rules. These rules are the basis of which all association football rules today stem from. Later competitions saw the 'Gentleman' or Southerners dominate with Old Etonians, Wanderers, Royal Engineers and Oxford University who amongst them took 19 titles. Queens Park withdrew in the semi-finals of the 1873 cup (which due to the format being played that year meant that all the challengers to Wanderers' trophy played a competition for the right to throw down the gauntlet and play the holders, hence the full name FA Challenge Cup) because they had trouble raising travel expenses to pay for the constant trips to England, this directly led to the formation of the Scottish FA. However despite this, Queens Park continued to participate in the FA Cup, reaching the final twice, before the Scottish FA banned Scottish clubs from entering in 1887. In 1872, Alcock purchased the Football Association Cup for £20. That year, fifteen clubs entered the competition. Queen's Park reached the semi finals without playing due to withdrawals, but then after a goalless draw with Wanderers, were forced to withdraw as before the advent of penalties and extra time, they could not afford to come back to London for the replay. Wanderers won the cup outright in 1878 after what remains to this day one of only two hat tricks of wins ever. However they returned the cup to the FA in order for the competition to continue, on the condition that no other club could win the cup outright ever again.