Football, the beautiful game, in its simplicity is still 22 people kicking a pig’s bladder around with the aim of putting it in a goal. Football is a sport that has evolved over time with changes both on and off the field affecting the game.
Football today, like most sports, is now a business. Players are paid huge amounts of money per week and are transferred between clubs for even greater sums. Clubs exist on the stock market and are as answerable to shareholders and sponsors as they are to fans. Football is a global industry worth billions of pounds, a far cry from its humble beginnings.
Over a series of articles I will examine the origins, the impact and the future of “Modern Football” on England and the wider footballing world.
Origins
The birth of what has become modern football cannot be attributed, in my opinion, to one day or one event but rather to four events that occurred between January 1990 and October 1993. In January 1990 the Taylor Report was published. On 17th July 1991 the top flight of English Football resigned from the Football League to form the Premier League. In 1992/93 Season UEFA rebranded and reformatted the European Cup as the UEFA Champions League and 6th October 1993 Jean Marc Bosman submitted his legal cases against the Belgian FA, Standard Liege and UEFA. These four events shaped the changes that have occurred in English football over the last 25 years.
The Taylor Report
The Taylor report was an inquiry into the disaster at Hillsborough in April 1989, to establish the cause of the tragedy in which 96 Liverpool fans lost their lives and what could be learned from the aftermath. It would also make recommendations as to the safety of spectators at future sporting events. The Taylor report recommended that all stadia be converted into all-seater stadiums with each individual ticketed supporter having his or her own seat. All clubs would have to comply with this by August 1994. This saw a massive undertaking by the clubs with some replacing terraced stands with seating and others choosing to relocate to brand new purpose built all-seater stadia. The Taylor report also led to the end of perimeter fencing and the consumption of alcohol within sight of the pitch at football stadiums, although it is still permitted to be sold and consumed in bar and concourse areas.
The Forming of the Premier League
The Premier League began after Greg Dyke, then head of LWT part of ITV approached the “big five” clubs (Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal, Everton and Tottenham Hotspur) with the idea that it would be more financially beneficial if only the larger clubs in the country were featured on television. This lead to the breakaway of the Premier League where the television rights for the league would be shared between only the teams of the league itself, rather than the Football League’s policy of redistributing it across all four divisions. The clubs of the top division, with the backing of the Football Association, resigned from the Football League and formed the F.A Premier League. Sky outbid ITV for the rights to screen the games and the 1992/93 began with 22 teams changing the English Football landscape forever. The teams that founded the Premier League were Arsenal, Aston Villa, Blackburn Rovers, Chelsea, Coventry City, Crystal Palace, Everton, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, Middlesbrough, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, QPR, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur and Wimbledon.
The UEFA Champions League
The 1992/93 season marked the rebranding of UEFA’s top tier competition. Out went the European Cup and in came the UEFA Champions League. Group stages, that had been introduced the prior year became the norm as the tournament expanded, firstly through the addition of countries from the break up of the USSR and in later years as UEFA allowed more than one team from a country to enter the competition. As the size and popularity of the competition has grown so has the money with it, being worth upwards of £40 million just by qualifying for the group stages.
Jean Marc Bosman
In 1990 Jean Marc Bosman’s contract with Standard Liege expired and he wanted to move to French side Dunkerque. However Dunkerque refused to match Liege’s asking price and they refused to release his registration. Put on a reduced salary, as he was no longer part of the first team squad, Bosman decided to challenge football transfer rules at the European Court of Justice. In 1995 Bosman won in his case against Liege, the Belgian FA and UEFA and the cases were amalgamated into what is now known as the Bosman ruling. The ruling stated that the current transfer rules were against current EU law and stated that players could move to any other club within the EU once their contract had ended for no fee. The ruling also stated that could not discriminate against players from within the EU, so UEFA’s restriction on 3 foreign players in continental competitions was abolished.
These four events in the early 90s reshaped the footballing landscape. From the way people watch the game to the very make up of the English football pyramid, these years changed football forever and set the foundations for the modern game in England and across the world.
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