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Excerpts from “A Different Ball Game: The History of Ball Sports in America”, John R. Fitzpatrick, Picador, 2007 “The rise of both soccer (association football) and Rugby League within the United States is often ascribed to two unrelated events that happened in 1909. In truth, there is no...

Great stuff as always - once you have the premise, the amount of detail you squeeze in is quite incredible

1909-10 NRFU Season The 1909-10 season started with further expansion – Coventry joined the Lancashire section, and Newcastle joined the Yorkshire League, based on the Australian test attendance. As with all new teams, both struggled in their first year. The Welsh league was stable, and a...

The 1910 election to the Football league seemed uncontentious at the time, but the aftermath would make significant changes to the game. The three teams that faced re-election were South Liverpool, Merthyr Town and Glossop. As usual, there were a number of applicants to the League, mainly from...

1909-10 Football League season The 1909-10 season saw the first repeat champions for 10 years, as Fulham held off challenges from Aston Villa, Sunderland and Sheffield United to retain the title, although the margin was only 3 points. Their Stamford Bridge ground was usually full to capacity...

The next 2 will be 100% football, and the one after that should have a large chunk of football related stuff as well

1908-09 Australian Tour of Great Britain Following on the heels of the New Zealand tour the previous season, the first Australian tour played under the 13 man code was somewhat of a disappointment. Attendances (apart from the International matches) were lower than the corresponding matches...

That is superb.

Thanks - When I started, I had no idea that Evan had written a pro-privatisation book, or that Milligan would be the name that came up when I started looking for a suitable Conservative MP who used to be a journalist. Once I knew, I had to fit them into the original Paxo-as-PM idea

I need to edit that then - I had in mind David Davis as Tory leader before Paxo EDIT: Hopefully a bit clearer now

In the dressing room, the Prime Minister stood in front of the mirror, carefully adjusting the knot of his tie. As much as he hated appearing on television, especially in these circumstances, he knew how important appearances were, and he was damned if he was going to let his final appearance as...

Great stuff again. Loving the Crystal Maze reference

Lovely, lovely stuff. I particularly like the references to the impossibility of single party rule in Scotland.

Great stuff as always. And MAPS! I find they really help me because I don't visualise things in my head, which can make working out the after effects of the latest territorial adjustment difficult

1908-09 NRFU Season The 1908 season started with a wave of new teams, driven by the inaugural Welsh League season. As well as the new teams in the Principality, there was further expansion in England. Stoke joined the Lancashire section, the attendance at the New Zealand test convincing the...

As always, great to see this back. In terms of areas I'd like to see, Africa seems (at least in my memory) to have taken a bit of a back seat. But that's part of the joy of this TL - everywhere is different. Also, outside of the World Games, I'd be interested to understand which sports are...

1908-09 Football season The first Football League season with 3 divisions was characterised by the continued rise of clubs from outside of the original heartland of the North and Midlands. In the First Division, the traditional powers of Newcastle United, Aston Villa and Everton were surpassed...

1907-08 NRFU Season (Part III) With the completion of the New Zealander’s tour, the focus returned to the end of the domestic season, and the destination of the silverware. Again, both the Lancashire and Yorkshire leagues remained stable, and for once the concentration of teams in and around...

1907-08 NRFU Season (Part II) The 1908 Test matches between Wales and New Zealand (three games), England and New Zealand (one game) and the NRFU (retrospectively recognised as Great Britain) and New Zealand (a further three games) were the highlights of the tour. The originally envisaged...

Ed BALLS? ED Balls? edballs edballs