WOODWARD WOULD AND THEN WOULDN'T

In May 1904, Belgium, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland met in Paris and founded the Federation Internationale de Football Association. The England FA had not been consulted...an island state? Lord Kinnaird was appointed to review the situation. In 1905 the English FA  recognised the existence of FIFA and eighteen months later the home associations were allowed to join in! The FA treasurer D.B.Woolfall was elected as President of FIFA.

Belgium became the first non-British nation to be invited to play on "our" soil in 1923. This international friendly was played at Highbury on March 19th; 14,052 watched the home team win 6-1. As a "friendly", only 5 of the team that beat Wales two weeks earlier in the Home International Championship played, including Jimmy Seed (MORE OF HIM LATER IN ANOTHER BLOG).

A few of you ventured yesterday into reading the history of England's international tours. 1908 was a significant year when the FA deemed to allow England to visit Europe on tour and this took place between June 6 and June 13th, playing against Austria twice, Hungary and Bohemia.

In 1909, there was a similar tour to Hungary, for two games, and to Austria for one. The results read: in Budapest 4-2 win, and 8-2, then in Vienna 8-1.

Vivian Woodward, who won his first cap against Ireland on February 1903, was the English star goal scorer on this tour, notching 2, 4, and 3 in the three games.
Others contributing goals on this tour were:-
Bridgett 1,
Holley 4,
Fleming 3,
Halse 2,
Warren 1.

Woodward played 23 times for the England full XI and 41 games for the Amateur XI, as well as playing twice for the Great Britain XI in the 1908 and 1912 Olympics (both gold medals).

Coming from a wealthy family, Woodward didn't need "money" to play but his job as an architect often got in the way of his playing for Spurs from 1901 to 1906 (131 apps 61 goals). He then had 6 years at Chelsea.
He scored 29 goals at a rate of more than one a game in 23 appearances for England. He scored 4 hat tricks for his country and scored 57 goals in 44 amateur internationals.

Spurs were elected to the Second Division of the Football League in September 1908, having previously been in the "Southern League". Woodward scored the first ever goal for Spurs in the Football League, against Wolves winning 3-0.

In 1909 Woodward joined Chelsea, playing 116 times and scoring 34 goals. In 1914 he joined the Army and in 1915, he was given special leave to play for Chelsea in the FA (Khaki) Cup Final when Bob Thomson was injured. Thomson however recovered and Woodward volunteered to stand down since he had not played in any of the qualifying games. Chelsea lost to Sheffield United 0-3 at Old Trafford. The game was joyless and the last one until 1920.

During the war, as a captain in the PALS Battalion, he was injured in the thigh in 1916 and never played top flight football again, though he did go back to Chelmsford to play briefly for his "local" club.