ENGLAND'S claim to being the birthplace of organised football is unquestioned. What is less clear is which nation actually invented the game. There are numerous theories. In 2004 FIFA President Sepp Blatter officially acknowledged China as football's birthplace. "Tsu chu" â meaning literally "to kick the ball"â was a game played by soldiers during the Han Dynasty between 206BC and 220AD. The recently-revived Japanese game "kemari" was played around 600AD. Kemari is best described as an ancient form of "keepy uppy" with players standing in a circle kicking the ball to one another without letting it fall. Probably the most important early advance was made by the Romans. Their game Harpastum can be seen as a crude forerunner of both football and rugby. It was a team game played within a defined area with a small ball being kicked or thrown in an effort to get it past the other team's line. Tales abound in the centuries after the Romans left Britain of triumphant Anglo-Saxons kicking the heads of conquered Danes around the streets. But it was only in the Middle Ages that primitive modes of the game emerge in written records. In those days our "beautiful game" was downright ugly. Using a strawfilled, inflated bladder cut from a slaughtered pig, football was a violent, anarchic game between large mobs of young men chasing around the streets of a village or town. Often neighbouring villages played each other, with the goals being markers at the boundaries of each village, beyond which the ball had to be carried to score. Damage to property was frequent, as were fights and even death. "Mob football", as it became known, became especially popular on Shrove Tuesday. From about the 12th Century, the day before Lent was seen as ideal for men to indulge in a liberal dose of bad behaviour. Disorder was very much at the heart of the game's appeal. But in 1314 King Edward II imposed the first of many banning orders on football. His son and heir (Edward III) continued to enforce it. In 1349, 12 years into the Hundred Years' War and with the Black Death ravaging the population, Edward outlawed a range of sports. He ordered healthy young men to practise archery ready for war, rather than indulge in frivolities such as football. The bans proved impossible to enforce. The outlawed, and lawless, form of the game continued for generations. The first records of more organised football emerge in the 16th Century from an unlikely source â the Headmaster of Merchant Taylor's School in North London. Richard Mulcaster is described by many football historians as "the greatest 16th Century advocate of football". Mulcaster took the game off the streets, rid it of some of its unruly aspects and promoted it as a way to build school children's health and strength. He was the first to write about the need to establish teams, positions and referees. Football spread rapidly throughout England's public schools in various forms. Some would play a kicking game, others used hands too. These different codes would finally separate, into rugby and football, when the Football Association was formed in 1863. The FA outlined 13 rules under which games would be played. It wasn't long before the world followed suit. Some of those "local derbies" sound a bit tasty And to think you are not even allowed to put a "proper" tackle in nowadays
How disappointing.I read the title and thought we were going to get an insight to your love of cheese and whiskey.
