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.
After the quick demise of the Philadelphia Phillies pro soccer team in 1894, Philadelphia’s other pro team would return to the amateur ranks before going on to win Philadelphia’s first national soccer championship in 1897.
The decline of Philadelphia’s first organized league is followed by the appearance of the first professional soccer teams in the city.
In 1891, some 79 years before the founding of the NASL’s New York Cosmos, an All-Philadelphia team played the New York Cosmopolitans in the first of a series of games for the Philadelphia-New York intercity championship.
The conclusion of our look back at the short-lived Philadelphia Phillies soccer team of 1894.