Scotland v England in 1872: The story of football’s first international

England’s Harry Kane, fresh from his gentle pre-match warm-up, which essentially involved smoking a pipe, is running slightly uphill on a field wearing white knickerbockers. Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford, Jack Grealish and James Maddison are all running closely behind him.

The four players are shadowing their captain’s run to try to deflect a challenge from Billy Gilmour, who is doing his best to marshal Scotland’s defence in their bold 2-2-6 formation. Gilmour’s hat falls off and he is briefly distracted, allowing Kane to aim a shot that is about to hit the tape fixed between two posts before goalkeeper Angus Gunn catches the ball and runs with it in his hands to the halfway line to start a Scotland attack.

But no, the referee, watching from the side of the pitch, has decided the match is over. A few thousand people politely applaud, including the ladies who have been let in for free, then Kane demands three cheers for Scotland; hip, hip, hooray!

What on earth is this nonsense, I hear you cry. Yes, I know exactly what you are thinking… The Athletic doesn’t do match reports.

The above is an imagined version of a football match only in terms of the names of the players. The details — the knickerbockers, the hats, the tape for a crossbar — are all real. It is how the first-ever international football match — Scotland vs England — was played out in November 1872.

Tomorrow, the same teams meet at Hampden Park to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the match. The eagle-eyed will have noticed that it’s almost 151 years since November 1872, but this is modern football. It can experience scheduling issues, although it does have crossbars.

Football has evolved somewhat since the early 1870s. A few key principles remain the same, but the game we consume now is pretty much unrecognisable to the one that kicked it all off 151 years ago.

So let us strip everything back and return to where it all began. Think: the video for Right Here, Right Now by Fatboy Slim but in reverse, with, in this case, FIFA being the fat, gluttonous ball of money where we end up.

If you spool back in time, rewinding through Zinedine Zidane headbutting Marco Materazzi in 2006, Ronaldo having that silly haircut in 2002, Rene Higuita being caught out by Roger Milla in 1990, Diego Maradona (5ft 5in) leaping higher than Peter Shilton (6ft) to score in 1986, that Zaire bloke whacking Brazil’s free kick miles down the pitch in 1974, teams sailing to Uruguay for the 1930 World Cup… you eventually get all the way back to Scotland vs England, 2pm; Saturday, November 30, 1872. The genesis of international football.

And no, a bloke who pinches salt for a living wasn’t allowed on the pitch for pictures with the players at full-time.

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There was no stadium. The first-ever international football match took place in a field at the West of Scotland Cricket Club in Partick, Glasgow, on Saint Andrew’s Day.

Scotland’s team was basically Queen’s Park, who provided the entire Scottish XI (the Scottish FA had yet to be formed, so things were not exactly organised), while England travelled up by train. It took them 12 and a half hours direct and there was no wi-fi.

England’s XI was comprised of players from teams such as Oxford University, Cambridge University, 1st Surrey Rifles and… Crystal Palace.

Estimates of the crowd vary between 2,500 and 4,000 people, with women being let in for free. Fans stood right on the sideline, separated from the pitch by a rope. A ticket to watch the match cost one shilling and had written on it; ‘International foot-ball (CORR) match (association rules).

Ah yes, the rules.

As well as the handball rule for goalkeepers mentioned above which meant they could handle the ball all the way up to the halfway line, there were also no penalties or yellow and red cards. Heck, there weren’t even any shinpads. Hack away, lads.

Teams changed ends after each goal was scored (or at half-time if the game was goalless) and there were two ‘umpires’ in each half of the field, one representing each team, who could appeal to the referee (essentially the timekeeper) who was stood off the pitch on halfway and who would make judgments if the umpires could not agree on a decision. Think Graeme Souness and Roy Keane umpiring Liverpool v Manchester United and if they don’t agree, it’s up to Mike Dean.

There were corners, but not as we know them. If a defender kicked the ball out behind the goal line, yes, the attacking team would have a corner, but if the attacking team kicked the ball out, the defending team would kick the ball clear from the corner mark (there were no flags).

Also, when the ball was specifically kicked directly over the tape between the goalposts, by either side, it was a goal kick.

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As for the type of football on show, Scotland and England employed very different approaches; Scotland preferred more of a team-based passing game, while England’s individuals basically dribbled with the ball at every opportunity in the style of a rugby player running with the ball (surrounded by team-mates who would protect him) until he was enveloped in a scrimmage by the opposition. Think Spain’s passing game versus Brazil’s dribbling but much more rudimentary and considerably more violent.

A report in the Glasgow Herald basically said England were fatter than Scotland: “The Englishmen had all the advantage of weight, their average being about two stones heavier than the Scotchmen and they had also the advantage in pace.

“The strong point of the home club [sic] was that they played excellently well together.”

Both teams loaded their sides with forwards; Scotland played 2-2-6 and England were 1-2-7. It is unknown if Harry Maguire was still picked as the one centre-back.

One thing that was similar to today was the colour of the kit. Scotland wore dark blue (with a single red lion for a crest), with white knickerbockers (for the uninitiated, these were basically billowy 19th-century trousers) and blue and white striped socks.

England, meanwhile, were in white shirts complete with a similar version of today’s three lion crest and white knickerbockers. England also wore different coloured socks, or stockings, to help spectators identify who the players were. No numbers on the shirts, they wouldn’t get introduced until the 1920s.

Goalkeepers wore the same kit as the outfield players (no gloves). Oh, and everyone wore sort of jester-style loose hats, for reasons unknown.

So everyone was in thick, long-sleeved jerseys, trousers and hats. If you ever criticise a player for wearing gloves or undergarments in the depths of winter, think of 1872. They were wrapped up good and proper.

There were no substitutes, but bizarrely both teams swapped their keeper with a forward at half-time. Scotland’s captain, Robert Gardner, who also selected the team, presumably drew the short straw of going in goal as he went up front for the second half.

England’s captain — standing in for the injured Charles Alcock who acted as their umpire instead — was Cuthbert Ottaway, a man who represented Oxford University at five different sports and had a 150-run cricket partnership with WG Grace.

And what was the outcome? Decent game? Well, by all accounts it was a fast, furious, end-to-end thriller between two evenly matched teams, despite their differing approaches to this newfangled football malarkey.

Scotland hit the bar tape once and England hit the post, but despite there being 13 strikers on the pitch, it finished… goalless. You wouldn’t have wanted to be the England admin tweeting that result out.

(Top photos: Getty Images)