A new breed? Some observations about the careers of professional footballers in England, 1946–1985

Abstract

This article aims to illuminate and extend John Bale’s 1983 study of the geographical origins of professional footballers in the English League in 1950 and 1980, in which he discerned a ‘rise of the south’. It analyses the results of two new statistical surveys to determine the chronology and nature of this major shift in the football profession, but also to consider other aspects of the professional’s career in the period 1946–1985. The analysis reveals that this ‘southerning’ of the profession was a relatively rapid phenomenon, which had occurred by 1955 and was not evenly spread over the country, creating a conspicuous north–south divide. It also argues that factors within football, rather than wider demographic and economic changes, were responsible. Another major finding was that there was a ‘turn to youth’ after 1955, and that between 1955 and 1970, the percentage of teenagers making their first team debut doubled.