Football evolution: AFL and football's common ancestor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UkVZZnrC4E Sheffield United v Bury (1902) Current rules seem to be place for Football in that one.

Titus Only countries with a large population such as India get that privilege;) insert ‘chucking’ joke here.

Actually yes, that is a fair point: I seem to remember reading something about English factory owners having football teams for their workers in Brazil too- Pau Grande or somewhere like that.

no. that's not the case

When you manage to elevate the crushed coke can and effect a header then perhaps you're playing soccer.;-) BTW the Aust Football ball was initially the round ball and when the rugby balls were initially irregularly produced they were met with derision. Why then did they take over? Player experience counted for a lot. Perhaps ball availability in the post Tom Browns Schoolboys saw rugby type games and balls more common? Popular culture!! Anyway - don't tell Sean Fagan.

There's no evidence of Aust Football having borrowed from Sheffield. The reasonably acknowledged borrowings include school rulers from Rugby, Eton, Winchester & Harrow. Around the time in question there were only so many clear differences and often coincidental similarities. The suggestion of this article has no clear link and is based on coincidental similarities. As for the "English game of football" - in 1858-59 that did not exist in any identifiable stand alone manner. That more than any reason was why Melb could adopt cricket as is, & hockey but NOT football. 10-20 years later and as with Sydney we saw Association Football & Rugby Football being introduced into a pretty well virgin market where previously football was limited to once off events on festival days like Queen's birthday. By which time Melb rules had spread and the VFA had been formed. And at which point the community basis of the game rather than school based had been established which arguably put Melb football in a very highly evolved state regards community 'buy in'.

With Fussball, it's not hard. He's go off into paranoid rantings at just about any occasion.

I think I hit a nerve.

Its not quite that early, but heres a 1927 FA Cup final http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpftcY-7OwU

Steve, Dont underestimate the effect of British railway workers. South America saw a lot of them go over during the Age of Steam ... which also enabled easy inter-city sporting competitions. My gut feeling is that cricket was spread by the British Army, and association football was spread by British railwaymen and steamship crews.

fair dinkum the rest of the world thinks afl is a giggle :wink

Usual football illiterates with their "Biggest doesn’t automatically mean best". Yet, they love to talk about AFL's "big crowds" & "big ratings". What a bunch of hypocrites & clowns.

Except the only countries which _don't_ have soccer as their main code tend to be Ex-British colonies: USA, Canada, Australia, West Indies, India, Pakistan, Parts of SA etc, and Soccer is incredibly popular in places like Brazil and Mainland Europe that were never colonised by the Brits. I think there must be another reason why soccer conquered the world. I'm also unsure of how a game with British roots played by, amongst others, large numbers of Anglo-Celtic people on the Australian continent represents a lack of involvement with globalisation or Empire. It seems like a result of it, if anything.

Having being born & bred on Football in Sheffield first of all we aint serumble lad. By the time my generation came along(4 after the Sheffield Rules), the link to the handling part of the Sheffield Rules(we presume accuracy on that point) was long gone. In fact to handle the ball(goalie excepted) either playing in the street or in a park(if you wer luckie) was likely to cause dissension & at times fisticuffs. On the other hand these additions integrated into the FA rules"innovations such as goals with crossbars, heading the ball, corners, free kicks, throw ins, the player position known as the ‘kick through’ – which became known as the forward " were of course part of Association Football. Concentration on foot skills then(dribbling, passing, receiving) was what the average football playing lad concentrated on. Hands were taboo. So maybe there was common ancestor of two sports in Sheffield(seems vague at best) but then again they reckon we all come from one common ancestor in Africa. However you cant honestly tell me that Genghis Khan or Attila the Hun bear any resemblance to Tiny Tim (well maybe GK or ATH had big noses) or any member of the hippie movement. Common ancestor maybe,but since then Association Football has received input from dozens of cultures from around the globe,some of it good some bad. Sheffield is just one source of input to shaping the way football has developed Internationally. I leave it to Aussie Rules fans to decide whether Sheffield played much of a role in what the game is today. Then again wernt Einstein ,Marconi,Baird & Edith Piaf from Sheffield what cant us umble Sheffielders do.

The AFL might be the biggest sporting organisation in Australia, but it's all home grown, Macca's is a worldwide corporation. The AFL fund auskick, and some top tier state leagues, but very little funding to the hundreds of thousands of players and clubs in between.

Yes i think thats what he's getting at Damiano.Even though our Naional sides following at the last two world cups were the largest foriegn invasions by Aussies since WW2,they weren't actually proper Aussies.

My Thoughts exactly!!!! AFL is the biggest sport in Australia, they are like McDonalds of Australian sport, but we already have our own local cuisine in NSW & QLD which are better.

Biggest doesn't automatically mean best. eg McDonalds, Marlborough, Budweiser, Coke, Kodak, Ford, G.M, Exxon Mobil, Soccer etc

The whole codification timeline is interesting - because, the rules were very much local rules - and the Rugby school rules are a clear example of that!! The Melbourne Rules of 1859 were MFC only in the main - however, given the 'standing' of the MCC within the still very young Melbourne community - the lead was always going to be taken by MelbourneFC. And already by 1860 the rules had been declared the "Victorian Rules"......by a number of Melbourne based clubs mind you!! What was clear was that for the 'soccer' and 'rugby' type games - there was still a need for a unifying or clearly distinct code of rules. By 1862-1863 a series of meetings in London sought to do in general what the Cambridge Rules had sought to do within that institution. Those meetings failed to draw all together and the Rugby type advocates either left at the time or gradually thereafter. So, while the Rugby and Eton and Cambridge and Shrewsbury and Winchester and Harrow school rules all pre-date the Melbourne Rules - - there is still a special place in sporting history that the founding club of the game/code that established the rules in 1859 is still playing it today at the top level and have moved from the 'carpark' (the sloped hillside outside of the then MCC controlled cricket oval) onto the main arena. Of the 10 rules : 1 - the distance b/w goals and goal posts is no longer decided upon by the captains - however, there is no standard length of field but there is a standard distance b/w posts. 2. There is still a toss for choice of goal (this wasn't listed in the majority of other 'codes' at the time. Not until the revised 1863 Cambridge rules and the 1863 London FA rules. (i.e. absent in Rugby 1845, Cambridge 1856 and Sheffield 1858) 3. A goal must still be kicked fairly b/w the posts without touching them or any person on either side. This is the most clearly Australian Football Rule from the outset. There was a minor toying withit during the mid/later 1860s looking at allowing a goal via the scrimmage but that was dispensed with and returned to the original concept. 4. The dimensions of the field. Mentioned the kick off posts - they eventually became the 'behind posts'. 5. When a ball is kicked 'behind Goal', well, there's still a kick in after that happens. 6. The "mark" - you no longer have to call it yourself, the umpire does that. This rule is pretty well as was. No player from the oppositive side allowed to come inside the 'spot marked'. 7. Tripping initially was permitted, but no hacking. However, from May to July it became clear that tripping too should be illegal, and so too then was holding. Pushing was always 'qualified', initially that the player pushed should be in possession or in rapid motion. 8. Ball to be taken in hand only when caught from the foot or on the hop but not lifted from the ground. That's obviously changed. By the July 1859 revision it was permitted to lift the ball, then by 1860 it was limited again and by 1866 finally could be taken in hand at any time but not carried further than necessary for a kick and that's where the "..strikes it against the ground in every 5 or 6 yards" was introduced. 9. ball going "out of bounds" (and this was a unique phrasing, other codes often referring to 'touch'. The ball is still thrown in pretty well at right angles from the line at the point where it went out - - just now, it's done by a boundary umpire. 10. No throwing. That is retained today as well. So, all in all, not a bad transferance of the original 10 rules to the game today. You still mark, kick, don't throw, the handball wasn't described yet. Only that throwing was illegal. The thing about rules is what was not written was as important as what was. A quick look at the London FA rules of 1863 and they allowed a fair catch (providing a free kick) (#8). They had no throwing, but also stressed no passing, using hands. [noting this, it implies back to the Melb rules that the throw by hand was illegal but not a 'pass' by hand]. Also, Goals awarded when the ball passes b/w the goal posts or "..over the space between the goal-posts (at whatever height), not being thrown, knocked on, or carried" We know that the cross bar came in (from the Sheffield folk it seems), and goals were eventually permitted by whatever means the ball get's in the net other than a handball. Headers were not part of the London game, it's been documented that the Londoners laughed when they first saw fellows from Sheffield using their heads. But, the rules didn't say you couldn't. And the Sheffield folk are also credited with bringing in the corner kick. So, the London rules of 1863 still had a fair degree of flex to come. As did the Melb rules of 1859. But, in essence - both games were pretty identifiable even at that point in time.

...apply the same twisted logic to religion and see what u get. Quantity is not necessarily Quality ! IMHO ..soccer is such a silly game. Trying to head a ball with one's head, No use of beautiful hands... just 2 examples !! Did this game (soccer) evolve from a circus ?? ...fair dinkum its a giggle !