Quote: Paul Thexton "I think the past is a lot more murky than that - there's a lot of evidence to suggest that "football" (before it was formalised in the Association Football rules) was so named because the game was played 'on foot', as opposed to on horseback. Don't fall in to the trap of thinking it's called football because you can only play at the ball with the foot, the very early Association Football rules allowed handling of the ball!
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Wow, thanks. I've been curious about that for ages. Nice to know!
What i'm also curious about, if anyone else could enlighten me; before the play-the-ball was introduced - was there really a scrum formed after each tackle? That must have been ghastly to watch.
Also when the play-the-ball was first introduced. I understand it wasn't the PtB we have today (with two markers). So, what did it constitute?