The dinosaur lives on after 300 million years….

When war was declared on 4 August 1914, most of the country thought that the Football Association would follow the example soon to be set by cricket, and cancel all matches. But, despite opposition, matches were played in the Football League throughout the 1914-1915 season, and the FA Cup was organised as normal. 

For the remainder of the war, the Football League suspended its programme, but allowed clubs to organise regional competitions – pretty much similar to the matches played at the Recreation Ground between 1939 and 1945.

However, north of the border the Scottish League continued as normal…

On the 26th November 1914, with Heart of Midlothian comfortably leading the Scottish First Division, sixteen players exchanged their football boots for Army Issue. They enlisted to fight in France, inspiring many others to do the same.Seven members of the Hearts team were killed. Another, Paddy Crossan, was so badly injured that his right leg was labelled for amputation. He pleaded with the German surgeon, ‘I need my leg - I’m a footballer.’ His leg was saved but he died after the war from the effects of poison gas, which had destroyed his lungs.

The Cenotaph in Whitehall was first opened as a temporary war memorial on Peace Day, 19 July 1919, when celebrations to mark the end of the First World War were held throughout the UK and Ireland. 

The Times referred to Peace Day as "the greatest ritual day in our history"; the object of this state event was to represent society as a harmonious whole, united in remembrance, and to paper over the social tensions of the period…such a pity that today’s politicians didn’t study history.

Donald Bell was a defender for Bradford Park Avenue FC, but in November 1914, he joined the army. Then just two days after his marriage in 1915 he was sent to France. 

On 5 July 1916, during the Battle of the Somme, he won the Victoria Cross for outstanding bravery, by stuffing his pockets full of grenades, creeping up on an enemy machine-gun post and capturing it. He wrote to his mother “I must confess that it was the biggest fluke alive and I did nothing. I only chucked the bomb and it did the trick....” Five days later, he died, trying to repeat the same feat.
 
Women's football was ‘massive’ during World War One, drawing crowds of 53,000, even after the war had ended. So why did it disappear so dramatically…?

World War One was being fought and any man fit enough to play football had been sent to fight on the front line. Back home women not only took on their jobs, they also took their places on the football field. 

Women's football was already played throughout the land, but up until World War One it hadn't been well received. This all changed when the Football League suspended all of its matches at the end of the 1914-15 season. 

As a generation of young men signed up to serve king and country, so too did the women who were left behind. They answered the call, with many thousands taking on traditional male roles previously considered too dangerous for women - the most familiar image being the munitions factory girl.

Female workers converged upon the hundreds of factories that sprang up across the country, forming strong friendships that spilled over on to the playing fields during their breaks. 

Informal kickabouts became a popular pastime for the women and this was not missed by factory management. An activity that was previously considered unsuitable for the ‘delicate female frame’ was suddenly heartily encouraged as good for health, well-being and moral.

As the war progressed, the women's game became more formalised, with teams emerging from the munitions factories. Initially, the novelty of women playing football was used to raise money for war charities, with crowds flocking to see the so-called ‘munitionettes’ take on teams of injured soldiers and women from other factories. 

The Munitionettes' Cup was established in August 1917, with the first winners Blyth Spartans beating Bolckow Vaughan of Middlesbrough 5-0. Star striker Bella Reay scored a hat-trick to add to her 130 other goals that season. 

Perhaps the most famous of the ‘new teams’ was Dick, Kerr Ladies FC from Preston. Founded in 1917, their first match drew a crowd of 10,000 people. By 1920, a Boxing Day match against St Helen's Ladies was watched by 53,000 spectators at Goodison Park, with another 14,000 locked outside the ground trying to get in. 

When the war ended a nation devastated by the loss of so many attempted to put itself back together. One by one, the factories closed and women who had been galvanised and liberated during wartime, found themselves being quietly shunted back into domestic life, returned to their "right and proper place" in society…and sadly, a return to the dark ages. 

Football was no longer considered to be a health benefit - it was now seen by top physicians, as the "most unsuitable game, too much for a woman's physical frame".

On 5 December 1921 the FA met behind closed doors and agreed that football was unsuitable for females and it called on clubs belonging to the associations, "to refuse the use of their grounds for such matches". The ban changed the course of the women's game forever. 

The dark ages lasted for fifty years….proving pretty conclusively that the dinosaur lived on, despite the numerous claims made by paleontologists. 

In 1971 the FA finally lifted the ban on women's football. 

Dinosaurs still rule the world, but they now wear suits…..