Goalkeeper (association Football) - History

History

Football, like many sports, has experienced many changes in tactics that have generated positions, as well as made positions disappear. Goalkeeper is the only position that is certain to have existed since the codification of the sport. Even in the early days of organised football, when systems were limited or non-existent and the main idea was for all players to attack and defend, teams had a designated member to play as the goalkeeper.

The earliest account of football teams with player positions comes from Richard Mulcaster in 1581; however, he does not specify goalkeepers. The earliest specific reference to keeping goal comes from Cornish Hurling in 1602. According to Carew: "they pitch two bushes in the ground, some eight or ten foot asunder; and directly against them, ten or twelve score off, other twayne in like distance, which they term their Goals. One of these is appointed by lots, to the one side, and the other to his adverse party. There is assigned for their guard, a couple of their best stopping Hurlers". Other references to scoring goals begin in English literature in the early 16th century; for example, in John Day's play The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green (performed circa 1600; published 1659): "I'll play a gole at camp-ball" (an extremely violent variety of football, popular in East Anglia). Similarly, in a 1613 poem, Michael Drayton refers to "when the Ball to throw, And drive it to the Gole, in squadrons forth they goe". It seems inevitable that wherever a game has evolved goals, some form of goalkeeping must also be developed. David Wedderburn refers to what has been translated from Latin as to "keep goal" in 1633, though this does not necessarily imply a fixed goalkeeper position.

Initially, goalkeepers typically played between the goalposts and had limited mobility, except when trying to save opposition shots. Throughout the years, goalkeeping has evolved, due to the changes in systems of play, to be a more active role. Goalkeeper is the only position in which you can use your hands in the game of football. The original Laws of the Game permitted goalkeepers to handle the ball anywhere in their half of the pitch. This was revised in 1912, restricting use of the hands by the goalkeeper to the penalty area.

In 1992, the International Football Association Board made changes in the laws of the game that affected goalkeepers – notably the back-pass rule, which prohibits goalkeepers from handling the ball when receiving a deliberate pass from a team-mate that is made with their feet (the pass can be made with all the others parts of the body except hands). As a result, all goalkeepers were required to improve controlling the ball with their feet.