Women's Football History - Britiain

Women's football hit the scenes in 1895 in London as girls we're split into two teams - North and South London. Final score had the North beating the South 7-1 and pundits highly against seeing Women playing football and claiming they didn't have what it took to play the sport. However Women didn't give up in the fight and in 1920 the first Women's International game was played with a 25,000 attendance as Dick Kerr's Ladies (Preston based) beat French XI 2-0.

North London team from 1985.

After the first Women's International game was played more games we're played resulting in one of the highest attendances seen in a Women's football game with 53,000 turning out to watch the game between Dick Kerr's Ladies and St-Helens Ladies which saw Dick Kerr's team winning 4-0. However as things we're seeming to take a postitive step forward for the Women's game the FA introduced a new law in 1921 which banned Women from playing on Football League grounds stating that the world of football was unstable for Women and shouldn't be encouraged.

However football for Women took a large u-turn in 1969 as the Woman's Football Association (WFA) was formed with 44 clubs becoming members. This saw the WFA fight back against the law created by the FA in 1921 to eventually see it lifted in 1971 and allowing for there to be the first WFA cup played which saw Southampton beat Stewarton and Thistle 4-1. Not only this but it then allowed for the first official Women's international match to be played in 1972 Britain beating Scotland 3-2.

From this point forward Women's football continuted to gain support and eventually gained the FA's interest in 1983 as the WFA we're invited to be affiliate with them on the level of County Football Associations. This opened new doors for Women's football and allowed for a national league to be launched and a Women's Football Committe was also formed. Steps forward we're constantly taken from this point forward and the FA decided in 1994 to administrate the Women's game to see The FA Women's Premier League formed.

The FA's goal from this point forward was to have football being the leading sport participation wise for Girls and Women in England. This was achieved in 2002, three years ahead of schedule with key moments up to this point such as the appointment of Hope Powell as Full-time England Women's coach and the introductions of 20 centre's of excellence for girls playing a key roll in this statistic.

Since then the Women's game has continued in showing to the rest of England and the world that we can perform on a level that is sufficent enough to be watched not just by others but on a wide tv scale too as proven by the success of the Olympics team of 2012 as well as the success shown by the Women's England team in recent years which now sees them ranked 8th in the world after managing to reach the Quarter-finals in 2007 and 2011. 

Olympics 2012 team who reached the Quarter-Finals

Now the game of Women's football hopes to continue to move forward and not backwards. With the support of the FA and the community of football this is something that now looks to be achievable and to be able to have all consider football as a unisex game.