Philadelphia was central to the formation of the first two pro soccer leagues in the US, the National League baseball-backed American League of Professional Football, and the American Association of Professional Football, which played its first games before, and outlived, the ALPF.
Steve Holroyd looks at the history of the North American Soccer Football League, which existed for two short years right after the Second World War and featured the talents of Gil Heron.
A look at Christmas soccer in Philadelphia in the 1890s, the beginning of organized league play in the city.
The origin of soccer in Philadelphia rests squarely on the shoulders of the city’s 19th Century British immigrant population. British immigrants came to work in Philadelphia’s bustling steel and shipbuilding industries but large numbers came to work in the city’s textile trades. The soccer/textile connection can be found both in […]