To celebrate the Women’s World Cup, we are exploring the history of women’s football here in the UK, including at Brunel.
The first UK female football team was founded by Scottish suffragette, Helen Matthews in 1881 but the sport really took off when men’s competitive football was suspended during World War I. It was thought that organised sport would be good for morale and productivity in wartime factories and so female competitive sport was encouraged. The sport proved so popular that in 1920, over 50,000 spectators turned up to watch the women’s game at Goodison Park which was unprecedented at the time with 38,000 being the highest number of spectators for the male equivalent.
Sadly, despite the support of the nation, the Football Association (FA) felt differently and within a year declared the game ‘quite unsuitable for females’ effectively (if not officially) banning women from playing the sport. This was achieved by forbidding female players from using stadiums and pitches used by professional male teams. Thus preventing women from playing football by not allowing them the facilities or capacity to generate income to sustain the sport.
The restrictions on women’s football were only lifted in 1970 following unrest in the 1960s. In 1967, Patricia Gregory, questioned why there was no female competition as she watched her father play for Tottenham in the FA cup. She went on to form a women’s football team which attracted the attention of Arthur Hobbs who was already running an eight-team women’s tournament in Deal, Kent and invited Gregory’s team to join, thus creating the South-East of England League and later the Women’s Football Association (WFA). It was after the forming of the WFA, that the FA lifted the restrictions on Women’s football.
It has taken women’s football many years to recover but the sport has really begun to make a huge impact in the last two decades. Looking to Brunel, the first formal university team debuted in 1991 though there are references in the student newspaper ‘Le Nurb’, that women played football on campus as early as 1989.
Unfortunately, we don’t hold women’s football team photographs in the archives until 2011. Below is our oldest team photograph and the kit has since changed to the more recognisable Brunel dark blue and white.
Brunel is proud of former alumni, Anita Asante and Eniola Aluko, who represented England in the World Cup and UEFA tournaments as well as the 2012 Olympics. We look forward to watching the now turned TV pundits’ commentary on the current World Cup Competition.
Following the incredible performance by the Women’s England team in the UEFA Women’s Championship last year, we wish them all the best in the World Cup over the coming weeks.