A week ago we had a special night launching our book Histories of Women's Football in Britain and Ireland at the Embassy of Ireland in London. Thanks to Orla McBreen and all the Embassy for making it a special night. Images and a few words on it here: gjfootballarchive.com/2025/09/22/b...

Congrats to our lead organiser @garyjames.bsky.social on the publication of his two upcoming books! Hopefully you’ll be able to share all your research on them at #footycon26

Welcome to the Bluesky page for the Sport in History journal, the official journal of @bssh.bsky.social that covers all eras & contexts of sports history. If you want to find out more about the journal or submit a piece, please check our website: www.tandfonline.com/journals/rsi...

After our recent arrival here on Bluesky, we’ve continued our expansion of our online presence by joining LinkedIn! If you are on LinkedIn, please feel free to follow us on there via the link below ⬇️ Likewise, please feel free to share this news where you can!! www.linkedin.com/company/spor...

It’s been a few days since I got back from Belfast, but I just wanted to say that it was another great experience co-organising @footycon.bsky.social alongside @garyjames.bsky.social & Conor Murray. The #footycon community is always great & supportive and I’m Looking forward to #footycon26 already

Thank you to everyone who came along, engaged with online and/or promoted #footycon25, you made this a wonderful conference & we look forward to #footycon26 already. Whilst we’ll produce a “superthread” later this week, we just wanted to give a shout out to a few people…

Thoroughly enjoyed presenting about early Argentine international footballer Arnoldo Watson Hutton @footycon.bsky.social in Belfast

Pleasure to be part of the conference

Our last post for today sees the end of #footycon25 with 2 winners being announced, with Gabrielas Rios-Infante winning our day 2 best paper prize & @fionaskillen.bsky.social, Karen Fraser and @juliemcneillwrites.bsky.social winning our conference inclusivity prize, both sponsored by Routledge

Sadly, We’re into our final session of #footycon25 😭 but our penultimate paper of the conference sees Wesley Kirkpatrick talking about @arsenalfc.bsky.social manager George Allison & how the club became well versed in their advertisement of the club thanks to Allison’s career in journalism

Our final paper of this penultimate session of #footycon25 sees Mark Orton once again regaling us with his research on Argentinian football as he tells us about the lesser known son of Alexander Watson Hutton, Arnold, and his role in the history of Argentine football & rugby

Up next at #footycon25, we’re looking closer to home with quite a detour as @modernlepra.bsky.social talks through his fascinating journey of exploring Irish roots in Argentine football.

We’re back to sole presenters for the rest of the day & our penultimate session of #footycon25 sees Richard McBrearty of @scotfootballmuseum.bsky.social talking about the case for continuity and innovation in the emergence of Association football in Scotland

A change of pace now as we have a panel with @fionaskillen.bsky.social, Karen Fraser & @juliemcneillwrites.bsky.social talking about their joint book ‘A most unsuitable game’, released last August and covering the history of women’s football in Scotland

We’ve missed a couple of presenters here at #footycon with Christian Schröder & Andrew McFarland talking about the value of education through football and Spanish football respectively

Up next at #footycon25, we have #footycon veteran and our own Dutch maestro Jan Luitzen discussing early Dutch football between 1885-1899 titled: “A leather ball in Little Manchester: Earliest Dutch Football → EFC PW (Enschede) 1885-1899

This is so special! Thank you @footycon.bsky.social for always being so supportive of my research on diverse football fan cultures and practices (like producing sports romance fiction!). This award means so much to me😊 #FootyCon25 #SportsRomance 💕📚

As we’re just back from lunch, we just want to take a moment to celebrate the joint winners of our #footycon25 day 1 best paper, sponsored by Routledge , who are Tim Mills, with his paper on @carlisleunited.bsky.social & @kaseysymons.bsky.social for her paper on romance fiction in the AFLW sphere

Our final session before lunch on day 2 of #footycon25 sees Brian Griffin discussing Irish Footballers and Irish Football Fans in the British Armed Forces during the First World War

As we forgot to mention him (our bad) and we want to ensure that everyone gets fair coverage at #footycon25, here is our earlier presentation from Stipica Grgić giving us a very short history of women’s football in the former kingdom of Yugoslavia

Up next at #footycon25, we have Brandon Blakeslee discussing how football and infrastructure (and coffee) brought Colombia together between 1918-48

Session 3 of #footycon25 is underway with @matttayl.bsky.social discussing football and the origins of town-twinning (which you’ll see on almost any welcome sign to a town across the world) in post-war Europe

Our 2nd session at #footycon25 begins with a first time delegate, all the way from Mexico, in Gabriela Rios-Infante, (we’ve apologised to Gabby about the downgrade in weather a lot) who is talking about the philosophy of Women’s football in Mexico through an ethnographic Lens

To round out our first session of #footycon25, we have Russ Crawford, equipped with a colourful Hawaiian shirt to combat this miserable Belfast weather, talking about a history of American football in Northern Ireland

Up next at #footycon25, we have George N Koussis talking about the US & transitional referee networks circa 1962 and how it had implications between not only the US & UK, but the global game as well with @FIFAcom’s involvement as well You would have loved this presentation @refbooks.bsky.social

Up first on day 2 of #footycon25 is John T Lang talking about his beloved LAFC and how we can explore the identity of the club within Los Angeles

Day 2 of #footycon25 is up and running with @GaryJamesWriter giving us a brief intro of our 2nd day at Windsor Park

One great day over & another great day to go as we get ready for day 2 of #footycon25 at Windsor Park! Don’t forget to use the above hashtag when posting about the conference and we look forward to seeing all your great posts & pictures from the event 👀📸

Our final presentation of day 1 of #footycon25 sees @andymitchellmedia.bsky.social discuss the @netflix.com series ‘The English Game’ and how we can look back on the series in a historical context (warts & all) in the 5 years since its release.

The BSSH's Dr Lauren Beatty & Dr Karen Mailley of Hearts football Club are at #footycon25 talking about the Maroon Mile Project they’ve been working on to celebrate 150 years of Hearts & their work in the local community in Edinburgh

Our final session on day 1 of #footycon25 sees Phil Martin (@3eglintonterrace.uk) discussing why he feels that London, compared to many other places in the UK, is the true home of football ⚽️

To round out our penultimate session of day 1 at #footycon25 , we have Mike McGuinness (with his amazing Hawaiian shirt) presenting on tracking football histories through the medium of postage stamps!

Up next, we have Arran Hicks of @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social discussing his work on the 1954-55 tours undertaken by @DinamoMoscow and @Arsenal to try and promote relations between the UK & USSR during the Cold War

After a short break, presentations at #footycon2025 are back underway with Jyri Backman discussing the establishment of collective agreement in Swedish Men’s elite football

To round out session #5 of #footycon25 on day 1, @garyjames.bsky.social is showing us a short film on his recent research into the Manchester Corinthians he’s published his book on, with testimonies from the Corinthians themselves

Up next at #footycon25, we seem to be in a romantic mood as @lindseyafreeman.bsky.social talks to us about a brief history of kissing in women’s soccer. As Lindsey asked our delegates, if you can think of any famous kisses, let us know in the comments below 👇💋

To kick off session number 5 at #footycon25 is one of the biggest supporters of the conference, an always welcomed guest & our sole Aussie representative for this year @kaseysymons.bsky.social talking about HER kind of football (quoting Kasey Here) on the AFLW, Romance fiction & fandom.

To round out this 4th session at #footycon25, we have Iain Adams discussing his research on the Fanshawe Cup from World War 1 and how it links to the Sir Harold Bridgwood Walker Cup

Up next at #footycon25 is the legendary Dilwyn Porter from @icshc.bsky.social talking about football’s inclusion and the value it adds to the Oxford National Database. Dil is also our head judge of papers over the next two days, so we appreciate him taking the time to present as well

To make up the time difference, we’ve started again after a very tasty #footycon25 lunch break with Malcolm Dowden talking about the Gould affair and ‘soft amateurism’ in Newport Rugby between 1892-97

A bit later than planned… but a great pre-lunch panel at #footycon25 from a joint project between the @britishlibrary.bsky.social and @leedslibraries.bsky.social discussing the importance and unique value of football fanzines. Huge thanks to Helena Byrne, Laurence Byrne, Siobhán Doyle (1/2)

Our next #footycon25 presentation sees Alistair Firth discuss his work on commemoration and memory in Scottish football with footballers’ graves He’s doing you all proud @gedboy58.bsky.social

Up next at #footycon25, we have Tim Mills talking about football & museums as community led programming about his work with @carlisleunited.bsky.social

Up next at #footycon25 are Drs Lauren Beatty & Karen Mailley of Hearts football Clubtalking about the Maroon Mile Project they’ve been working on to celebrate 150 years of Hearts & their work in the local community in Edinburgh

He’s back again as @garyjames.bsky.social talks about his work on women’s football in Manchester at #footycon25, including his book released at the beginning of the year on the Manchester Corinthians

Our #footycon25 presentations are underway with one of our co-organisers Conor Murray discussing the roles of Windsor Park, Northern Ireland in the Cold War between 1955-1961

We’re underway at #footycon25 with our lead organiser @garyjames.bsky.social leading our delegates through the proceedings of the next 2 days & Irish FA CEO Patrick Nelson giving our delegates a few introductory words & a couple of anecdotes on Pat Jennings, who bares the name of the room we’re in

Thank you Les (@plasticspam.bsky.social). We look forward to seeing you at a future edition of the conference as you’re always a welcome sight and you’re always been a huge help to the conference ⭐️

Look out for our coverage of this year’s @footycon.bsky.social across our channels over the next 2 days. We’re delighted to be covering #footycon25 and we look forward to sharing what is sure to be a great conference with you!

We’ve now arrived in Belfast for this years #footycon25. Be sure to look out for our coverage of this year’s @footycon.bsky.social across all of our social media channels, which you can find in the link in our bio 🔗