Paul Rouse

Now, there had been soccer played from the 1890s, and you're right, it's the story of expats and traders and soldiers and sailors bringing it wherever they went.

But it's also the story of Italians who went to work in England.

So you see some of the main people, we'll see it with Pozzo, the great Italian manager of the 30s.

He loved the game and he got it because he was sent by his family textile trade to work in the north of England.

He ended up befriending Manchester United players and managers.

But that connection of commerce and of finance, of trade is important.

And you get an anglophilia of people who just think England is the most modern country in the world.

We'll adopt the game.

And then there's the joy of playing.

So you had the first clubs in the 1890s and before the war, you had Italian clubs being established, playing games with each other, hugely influenced by England.

But after the 1920s, you had an explosion of interest in the game.

You get the broader commercialization with the building of grounds because such was the interest in people, not just playing, but also now watching others play.

And crucially, the identification of clubs

with areas and with towns and with cities.

And it became a matter of civic pride to have a decent team to represent you, to compete in the championship.

And what Mussolini did was to oversee through his men who were out into various organizations was to essentially

take control of Italian soccer by organizing the establishment in no particular order of the amalgamation of some clubs in some cities so they would have a really strong presence.

Number two, the establishment of an Italian league.

Number three,

the devotion of greater focus to the Italian national team.