Rugby League
The Rugby League game we see today- fast and athletic is very different from the game that was launched by 21 clubs meeting at the George Hotel, Huddersfield in 1895.
The
League has constantly adapted itself, it has changed it's rules and it has even
change it's named. These changes have all been to try to make the game look more
attractive to more people in the established Heartlands and in the areas outside
where they want to make an impact.
When Rugby league was first founded, it's rules were no different from that of Rugby Union, in fact when it was first formed it wasn't even called Rugby League, it was known as The Northern Union.
The Northern Union, rose out of the economic and class differences between the rulers of Rugby Union and the strongest northern clubs. Drawing on a far wider social base than the upper and middle-class clubs of the south, they wanted to compensate players for income lost due to playing the game - so-called "broken time".
When they pursued this demand at the 1893 Annual Meeting of the Rugby Union, they were outvoted.
When this was announced 21 leading clubs, (Seeing that there would be no
compromise) chose to leave the union and set up their own organization, The
Northern Rugby Football Union, which was founded in 1895.
In this early form the game was explicitly anti-professional - players were
banned if they had no job, or belonged to what were regarded as unrespectable
trades. And it was played to the same rules as previously.
Rugby League has always been prepared to adapt it's rules to make the game more attractive to spectators, It has always aimed to expand beyond it's initial starting boundaries in Yorkshire, Lancashire and Cheshire. And the relationship between The Rugby League and The Rugby Union has always been difficult.
Players were allowed to go professional in 1899, although players that did go professional still had to remain in full time work. Changes that happened on the field had already started before players were allowed to become professional, the line-out was abolished in 1897 and by 1906 the Rugby League had taken on the 13-a-side format.