Ángel Zárraga

During the 1920's the Mexican artist Ángel Zárraga produced a series of vibrant paintings of footballers.
More to follow...

Sectarianism in 19th century Edinburgh

  Edinburgh Evening News 07.09.80 

John Sweeney played in the first match between Heart of Midlothian and Hibernian on Xmas Day 1875. He played for Hearts until 1881, making 53 appearances and scoring 10 goals. 

Ramón Unzaga

Ramón Unzaga, pioneer of the bicycle kick, was a versatile sportsman who excelled at sprinting, javelin, high jump, diving, and waterpolo as well as football.
He made 8 appearances for Chile, featuring at the 1916 and 1920 South American Championships.

Irish Association Football in Argentina

Lobos Athletic Club 1892

Here is a link to the article Irish Association Football in Argentina by Víctor Raffo. 
The influence of Irish settlers on the development of football in Argentina, particularly the Lobos Athletic and Club Atlético Porteño is examined. Lobos A.C were important in the development of Alumni A.C.
Lobos were also the first Argentine side to play abroad: In 1899 they traveled to Montevideo, beating  Albión (2-1) and Peñarol (2-0) before a revolution forced their departure aboard a battleship!

Petrograd

August 1914:  2 matches featuring Petrograd champions Kolomyagi. The first against  Moscow champions KFS, the second, as far as I can make out, against a team from Samara (KVOD).

Geary equalises for Everton

29.11.90
Plenty of animation behind the goal at Anfield. Not much sign of life in the Blackburn defence though.
Fred Geary played 100 games for Everton in 6 seasons, scoring 86 goals. This was his 13th goal of the season 1890-91, which he ended with 20.

Herbert Chapman: Football Revolutionary?

 Mr Chapman with Arsenal players on the golf course in 1929. L-R: Unknown, Tom Parker, Alex James, David Jack, Herbert Chapman. David Jack with a cigarette , Alex James with plus fours that are about the same length as his football shorts.

Herbert Chapman was undoubtedly one of the most influential figures in the development of Association football. Here is a link to a paper by Tony Say of the University of Warwick entitled
Herbert Chapman: Football Revolutionary? It's a good read.
http://www.la84foundation.org/SportsLibrary/SportsHistorian/1996/sh16h.pdf

Some of Chapman's most notable tactical innovations are given some historical context- maybe not so much revolution as evolution.

Go Ahead

c 1890

This picture is not immediately recognizable as a football team, the long trousers and berets- perhaps the only clue the shinguards on the 2 centrally seated men.

It is however Wageningen Cricket and Football Club Go Ahead. Established in 1886 Go Ahead were founder members of the Netherlands Football and Athletics Association. 
They played in the Eerste Klasse Oost from its inception in 1896 until 1903, when they merged with Victoria (founded in 1889*) to become Go Ahead Victoria Combination.
GVC still exists as the Wageningen University football team.

*the GVC website gives Victoria's foundation year as 1892.

Football...seems to rouse him as nothing else can.

The Lancashire Daily Post 06.06.34

23.02.34: Fenerbahçe v Galatasaray. Nominally a friendly, the match descended into chaos.

Portugal v Argentina, 1928

Argentina's first official international against European opposition came on their way to the 1928 Olympic Tournament, On April 1st 1928 they faced Portugal at Sporting's Estádio do Lumiar.
The game, watched by 20,000,  ended in a goaless draw. 

Portugal
António Roquete	Casa Pia
Carlos Alves	Carcavelinhos
Jorge Vieira  ©	Sporting
Martinho Oliveira	Sporting
de Serra e Moura	Sporting
César De Matos	Belenenses
Valdemar Mota	Porto
João dos Santos	Vitória Setúbal
Pepe	Belenenses
Vítor Silva	Sporting
Sub: Alfredo Ramos (Belenenses)  replaced Vítor Silva @ 32 minutes

Argentina
Octavio Diaz	Rosario Central
Ángel Segundo Médici	Boca Juniors
Ludovico Bidoglio ©	Boca Juniors
Saul Calandra	Estudiantes de La Plata
Fernando Paternoster	Racing Club de Avellaneda
Rodolfo Orlandini	Club Sportivo Buenos Aires
Natalio Perinetti	Racing Club de Avellaneda
Pedro Ochoa	Racing Club de Avellaneda
Roberto Cherro	Boca Juniors
Domingo Tarasconi	Boca Juniors
Raimundo Orsi	Independiente

    Jorge Vieira

   Ludovico Bidoglio

Blackburn Rovers

There's always one isn't there? In this case it appears to be Arthur Cowell, on the extreme right. I've checked other Rovers pictures from  the era and there doesn't appear to have been a tradition for one of the jerseys to have been in contrast to the others, so maybe Cowell just has his top on back to front?

The players pictured are: Miles Chadwick, Arnie Whittaker, Bob Crompton, Sammy McClure, Adam Bowman, Willie McIver, Tinker Davies, Fred Pentland, Sam Wolstenholme, Billy Bradshaw & Arthur Cowell.

I first saw this picture on https://twitter.com/footballmemorys