AN ARTICLE BASED ON DIGITAL NEWS
It all started in the heart of Britain’s capital when postindustrial revolution London was filled with smog, dirt, children up chimneys, oil lamps, large hats and very messy football matches.
It was also the year Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation led to slavery being abolished in the United States of America and the ‘Croix Rouge’ – that is the Red Cross to me and you were founded. So for humanity, 1863 was a special year on many fronts.
Today the FA has become the leader of English football. It grows participation in the sport, promotes diversity and regulates football for everybody from across the country to enjoy. Amazing that after 150 years, the born ideology encapsulating the FA is still kept pumping through its veins.
The birth of the FA is attributed to Ebenezer Cobb Morley (1831 – 1924), a solicitor and sportsman living in Barnes, South-West London. Ebenezer believed that football as it was then, should have a set of rules in the same way that the MCC had a set of rules for cricket. Cue the captains, secretaries and other representatives of a dozen or so London as well as suburban clubs meeting at the now infamous ‘Freemasons Tavern’ (now called the ‘Connaught Rooms’ in honour of the Duke of Connaught) in London. The goal being to frame a set of laws with rules, codes and guidelines; all for the betterment of football.
In a whos who of English football, the clubs represented at the first meeting were: Barnes, ‘No Names’ (now Kilburn), Crusaders, Crystal Palace, Perceval House, Blackheath, Leytonstone, Charterhouse, Surbiton, Civil Service (War Office), Kensington School and Proprietory School. New rules, regulations and fresh ideas on how ‘the beautiful game’ (which was not so beautiful back then) were drafted by its premier secretary Morley in agreement with the aforementioned clubs.
However, it was not until six meetings later that a consensus was agreed and the FA could finally approve these new rules. The very first match played under these new rules was between Barnes and Richmond on Saturday 19 December 1863. Unsurprisingly, the match ended in a 0-0 draw but the rules which set football on its long track around the world were born.
Speaking on the new rules the FA framed for football all those years ago, Manchester United and England legend Sir Bobby Charlton says, ‘we should recognize that those rules did not simply make it possible to play football; they embodied the spirit and heritage of the English game’.
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