The First Football Ground

Crystal Palace Sports Ground

Professional football was born in the North of England. For many years there were no professional clubs south of Birmingham. The change to a professional game also brought great changes in the way football was played and organised.

Clubs now needed to charge the public to watch matches. This meant building fences or walls around the grounds and collecting money at the gates.

Crowds

The crowds coming to games also grew very quickly.

• 2,000 people attended the first Cup Final in 1872, but they did not pay to see the match.
• In the 1888 Cup Final they were forced to close the gates for the first time, with 18,000 paying customers inside the ground.
• 66,000 were at Crystal Palace to watch the 1897 the Cup Final between Aston Villa and Everton. Until the late 1880s the FA Cup was the only football competition played in England.

• Friendlies

• There was a Scottish Cup and Welsh Cup, but for most of the season English football fans could only watch ‘friendly’ matches between local teams.

At first these games were well attended, but the public soon became bored with watching the same teams playing each. There were also problems when teams did not arrive for matches, or when they did not send their best players. Crowds began to fall.

English football needed a new competition. A competition lasting the whole season and involving all the best teams in the country.