There are so many ways an individual can get involved in a sport like football, from meticulous management to prickly punditry. The beautiful game is full-to-bursting with colourful characters, some who’ve captured the hearts of the sport’s following and some who’ve assumed the role of the pantomime villain.
One thing’s for certain though, there are some individuals who have quite simply shaken up the football world and stamped their influence on the sport. Some argue that these people are regarded as pioneers, who have shaped the footballing landscape into what it represents today.
Here then is a look at ten individuals who have changed football for the better.
#1 Pele
Where better to start than with the undisputed king of football. Even with the barnstorming heroics of little Lionel and crafty Cristiano, Pele, for most, still remains the greatest player to ever grace the sport.
Three World Cup titles and more than 1,000 professional goals to his name, the Brazilian won pretty much every competition he could, doing so while exhibiting electric energy and unprecedented skill at the same time. Every time he put on the yellow jersey of his beloved country, incredible things were expected.
It’s not only his playing ability which renders him such a revolutionary, though. Amidst a time when physicality was the focal point of football, Pele can be viewed as the catalyst for the free-flowing, attacking style of football we bare witness to today. His frame was not the most physically imposing by any means but, like his Argentine counterpart Messi, he capitalised on a low-centre of gravity and quick feet to redefine the way football was played.
On top of that, his work with the New York Cosmos and success in the USA enabled a country renowned for its hostility and dislike towards the sport to reevaluate football as a whole and ‘soccer fever’ quickly swept the nature, courtesy of ‘The King Pele’.
#2 Jean-Marc Bosman
If controversially throwing a spanner into the works is part of the criteria to make this list, then Jean-Marc Bosman is an essential inclusion. While the aforementioned Pelé revolutionised the game on the pitch, Belgian Bosman did his best to do the same off of it.
On 15th December 1995, the European High Court of Justice passed what would be known as the ‘Bosman Ruling’ - football and player power really hasn’t been the same since.
Five years prior to this, Jean-Marc Bosman had been left angered and despondent after his desire to move from FC Liege to Dunkirk was dealt a massive blow. Liege wanted to keep Bosman and so slapped on an almighty asking price which ultimately caused Dunkirk to pull out of any deal. Bosman took Liege to court and quickly crafted the ‘Bosman Ruling’ which entailed the free movement of players between clubs and EU countries. From this point onwards, players could run down their contract at one club and then move freely to another.
As with any gigantic shift from the status-quo, the Bosman Ruling was met with a sense of hostility from some but nonetheless it remains an iconic legal alteration in the game’s history. Jean-Marc himself has had a difficult twenty-or-so years since, spiralling into depression and alcholism, but his legacy lives on and Sportskeeda is pleased to have heard recently that the 52-year-old is on the up.
#3 Jimmy Hill
It’s difficult to describe exactly what Jimmy Hill’s primary occupation was. From player to manager to TV personality, he plied his trade in every avenue possible but, leading on well from Bosman, it was his influence over player-power which is regarded as his most significant achievement.
The London-born professional started out playing for Brentford and Fulham, playing nearly 300 games for the latter, but that simply wasn’t enough for Hill, who became chairman of the Players Football Association in 1957 – the year in which he would lay down a law that arguably characterises the game today. Hill successfully campaigned for the abolition of the maximum wage, which then stood at £20 per week. Fulham teammate Johnny Haynes was heavily involved in the process and himself became the first player to earn £100-per-week.
Hill moved on rather swiftly to the world of management with Coventry City, leading the Sky Blues to their first ever promotion to the top flight. A shimmering broadcasting career followed, in which Hill made over 600 appearances as presenter of ‘Match of the Day’, which many believe owes its present success to Hill’s charismatic approach in front of the cameras.
By scrapping the maximum wage, Hill may be regarded as the reason for the mammoth money we see in the sport today, but his impact on football has been wholly positive. Few will ever match the love of the game possessed by Hill who simply couldn’t keep away from it.
#4 Sir Alex Ferguson
Since the Scott bid farewell to his beloved Red Devils in 2013, Manchester United have struggled to maintain the sensational success that was so commonplace during Ferguson’s reign, spending big, going through managers like running water and, ultimately, failing to emulate their former heroics.
Ferguson’s success arose from great man management, tactical genius and a raw hatred of failure. In his career with United, Ferguson transformed the club from one of mediocrity in the the mid-1980s to a team that hoovered up trophies, including thirteen Premier League titles and two UEFA Champions League crowns. Arguably the most Romantic aspect of Ferguson’s glittering career was how he sought success on the biggest stage imaginable, instilling a group of massive egos with the aggression, determination and physicality of lower league Scottish football. He was a humble, down-to-earth, globally renowned success and this paradox is what makes his legacy so important to football today.
From Fergie time to hairdryer treatment, many managers would claim to use Ferguson’s philosophy as a template for their own success and why not? Every game he led his side into was a ‘must-win’. He bought well and ensured teams gelled together and, in Ferguson’s eyes, there is so much more to management than merely setting up a few cones on a cold Monday morning and picking the team on a Saturday.
#5 Eusebio
Eleven Portuguese top division titles to his name, 1965 Footballer of the Year and 473 goals in 440 games for Benfica, Eusebio really was a stellar talent. The forward played with an appropriate blend of passion and modesty, haunting many a defence in his pomp, but it is arguably the path he paved for footballers of African origin to play for European national teams which remains his greatest accolade of all.
Following his death at 71 two years ago, Eusebio’s legacy is like no other. He was born in the Maputo region of Mozambique, but it was 12,000km north, in Lisbon, where he would make the biggest impact of all. Prior to Eusebio, it was practically unheard of for a player from Africa to reach the highest level, rendering him the first world class export from the continent.
African players representing European nations is normal in modern football, with an array of talents from Patrick Viera to Patrice Evra opting to play for nations outside of their continent of origin and Eusebio is to thank for this. So, you may remember the name for his electrifying pace, rifle of a right boot and as one of the greatest to never lift the World Cup trophy, but Eusebio has done as much on a political level as on a football one.
#6 Zinedine Zidane
If you’re looking for a real rags-to-riches story, put down Jamie Vardy’s acclaimed autobiography and turn your attention to one of the first in the modern football era. Zidane’s parents emigrated to France from Algeria before the Algerian war began and Zidane himself grew up as one of five siblings part of these second-generation Algerians in the destitute Marseille suburb of La Castellane.
This financial and social set-back only fuelled Zidane’s determination to succeed and, after progressing from Canne’s youth academy to the first-team, he went on to become one of France’s most iconic footballers, assuming the role of the nation’s poster boy at the 1998 World Cup, where he scored a brace in the final to earn Les Bleus the title of world champions for the first time ever.
Question marks still hang over Zidane’s temperament with many suggesting he lacked discipline and was a very petulant player. But, as shown by his current successes as Real Madrid manager, he is a football man through-and-through and despite growing up in a family where a Wednesday night dinner of bread and chips was regarded as something of prestige.
He tore through the prejudice and indifference to become one of the greatest pioneers in recent football history.
#7 Herbert Chapman
It’s impossible to do Herbert Chapman’s influence on football justice in a mere few paragraphs; that in itself epitomises how much he contributed to the game. Many regard the former Arsenal and Huddersfield manager as an innovator, years ahead of his time.
In his first season at the former, in 1925, Chapman lead the Gunners to both their highest-ever finish in the first division (2nd) and an FA Cup quarter-final. He moulded one of the greatest Arsenal teams of all-time which, despite his untimely death in 1934, went on to win five league titles that same decade. It wasn’t though what he achieved, it was how he achieved it; Chapman was a pioneer for modern management.
He ensured the club had physiotherapists and masseurs to maintain the physical fitness of his squad, requested that he chose the team each week, rather than members of the board, and instituted the concept of signing players from abroad, including one of the first black professionals Walter Tull.
Pretty much every aspect of football management today can be linked back to Chapman’s revolutionary work. As well as new tactical prowess, Chapman spearheaded developments in the game such as the addition of clocks in stadiums, the implementation of floodlights and numbers on player shirts.
#8 Arthur Wharton
In 2012, it was confirmed that just over 32% of footballers plying their trade in England’s top flight were black. Perhaps this doesn’t represent concrete equality in the game but it’s a far cry from Arthur Wharton’s days. Born in Ghana, formerly the Gold Coast, in 1865, Wharton is well-regarded as the first ever black professional footballer.
Influential not only in football, Wharton was an all-round top sportsman, competing at a high-level in cricket and cycling also. Following an appearance for Darlington, Wharton went on to play for a host of clubs at the end of the 19th century, strangely deployed on the wing as well as his preferred position of goalkeeper. He played with athleticism and energy and, although forgotten by many, achieved something, quite frankly, tremendous in the context of the time.
Wharton challenged diversity and although his appearance were often met with anger and hostility, he fought back, simultaneously displaying modesty and pride.
#9 Sylvia Gore
When thinking of influential women in football, the majority of names that spring to mind are most likely still engaged and active in the game today. This underpins exactly how late the flourish of women in football has been, especially compared to the rise of ethnic diversities in football. This is what makes MBE Sylvia Gore’s story all the more remarkable.
Born in Prescot, England in 1944, Gore holds the accolade of scoring the England national women’s team’s first ever goal in its first official game against Scotland in 1972. Despite the sport being banned for women in the UK for a 50 year period, Gore continued to play nonetheless, albeit on bad quality pitches with poor facilities. Football was a priority in Gore’s life; she once spoke of quitting her day job to partake in a Corinthians football charity tour in South America, which enabled her to showcase her prolific goal-scoring ability in front of thousands of fans.
Gore once scored 134 goals in a single season; she was engulfed by the game from a young age (her father John played for Prescot Cables) and she laid down a marker for women in football, playing through a time of sporting oppression.
#10 Johann Cruyff
Tiki-taka, carefully crafted turns and rewarding youth set-ups; all have daring Dutchman Johann Cruyff to thank for their inception. During his reign as Barcelona manager in the early 1990s and late 1980s, Cruyff won the European Cup and four successive Spanish league titles.
He placed emphasis on retaining possession and wanted his side to play simple football. A young Pep Guardiola was heavily influenced by the 1974 World Cup finalist and such tactics were employed in Guardiola’s success with the Catalan club twenty years later.
Cruyff set up La Masia youth academy with Barcelona and was an advocate of allowing young talent to flourish through games with the first team. In his playing career, he scored some of the most sensational goals of the century, impressing with skill and style in the process. His creation of the skill move the ‘Cruyff turn’ remains the bedrock of his glittering legacy.
Eight Eredivisie titles and a European cup with Ajax, Cruyff was sensational off the pitch as well as on it and, with one of the greatest football brains of all time, he is the main pioneer of the way many teams desire to play today.
