Pea Soup Matches: how women's football was, and can still be, for the working class

A guest piece by J Cardy

Hi, Grace here. I’m really thrilled to be running this tremendous newsletter from

J Cardy

. I personally found it a fascinating look into the history of women’s football in England, how it’s been shaped by working class culture, and why that needs to be true in the future.

In 2023, then Chelsea Women’s manager Emma Hayes called women’s football in the UK “quite a middle-class sport’ and said that players come from “suburban belts around the training grounds. Why aren’t we going into London? Who in their ivory tower has been dreaming up this prawn sandwich girls club?” 

When Emma Hayes speaks on the state of Women’s football in England, you listen. 

The changes in English Women’s football so far this decade have been stark but welcome. The increased attention brought on by the Lionesses’ 2022 Euros victory ushered in a new generation of women’s football fans. Attendances across the WSL have increased dramatically, with both Arsenal and Chelsea selling out their main stadium for Women’s games and Aston Villa recently announcing that all WSL home games will be played at Villa Park. Even a club like Bristol City that don’t have the luxury of a Premier League club backing them made Ashton Gate their main stadium, having some of the best home support in the WSL throughout the 2023/23 season. 

It's not just attendance that’s grown after Euro 2022 glory; the government committed £600 million to invest in women’s sports, and a review led by former England captain Karen Carney suggests ways further to grow the game as they transition to new governing body Newco. 

Despite this progression, we mustn’t get complacent and forget Hayes’ candid warning. As brilliant as it is to see a generation of young girls having genuine female role models to look up to, we can’t forget that at its heart, English football is a working-class game. 

The rise of the Premier League has all but destroyed this culture in Men’s football. Exorbitant ticket prices and state-owned clubs have meant fans are increasingly disconnected from clubs that their families have supported for generations. This is why such an influential figure like Emma Hayes highlighting this “middle-class sport” is so important, as we are currently at a tipping point with English women’s football, and it has an opportunity to deliver the game back to the working class. 

The fifty-year ban on the women’s game in England from 1921 to 1971 - that prevented women from playing on FA-affiliated pitches - is a black mark for the game in this country, still rightly used as an example of how far the sport has come today. However, the stories of the working-class women who were building the game often go ignored. It is vital that during a new age of growth for the sport, we remember them, their struggle, and the power that women’s football holds. 

During the First World War, with most young men in the country sent off to fight, women were expected to take up typically male roles such as working in factories to make ammunition and weapons. The role of factories in the creation of a plethora of English football clubs is still obvious today. I mean, we have ‘Arsenal’ and ‘The Hammers’, so it’s hard to escape the impact the industrial revolution had on modern sports. But while modern sporting institutions were born from these factories in the late nineteenth century, the early twentieth century saw a different footballing culture emerge. Women’s Football clubs subsequently formed from this period, most famously Dick, Kerr Ladies from Preston - born from factory workers from the company of the same name - who would play in charity games to raise money for the war effort. 

Dick, Kerr Ladies were able to draw crowds of tens of thousands while men’s football was suspended, and they showed the power that women’s football held by raising money and creating a community for these women. They would travel the country to play while still working full-time, raising £50,000 over 67 games while playing in front of around 900,000 people in total. 

This is a VERY simple explanation of Dick, Kerr Ladies so I encourage anyone to learn more about their fascinating history, however, I want to focus on the movement they inspired. 

The North-West, an area still heavily dependent on the mining industry, was hit particularly hard by the high post-war unemployment rates and the fall in the price of coal. When the government denationalised the coal mines and the new private owners threatened to cut wages up to 50%, those communities were hit incredibly hard and fought against this, leading to April 1^st, 1921, when the miners were locked out. 

All the information for this coming explanation comes from the excellent essay "Plucky Lasses," "Pea Soup" and Politics: the Role of Ladies' Football during the 1921 Miners' lock-out in Wigan and Leigh” by Professor Alethea Melling, whose research on the topic brought to light the plight of these women. 

Inspired by the national success of Dick, Kerr Ladies, during the miner’s lockout of 1921, women from Wigan and Leigh decided to organise games to raise money for local striking miners to help feed their families; they would become known as the ‘Pea Soup’ matches.

They were typically married vs single women, although sometimes women vs men games were organised, and they were usually played in fields, but thousands would turn up to watch and donate to the strike fund. It’s not just the money raised that’s important in the ‘Pea Soup matches’, but the community that they proved women’s football can build, which was invaluable in their struggle against the mine owners. 

Post-war Britain was a hotbed for Women’s football, and it proved its popularity, but it also showed the political power it held. In a fight against their bosses, miners could rely on these fairly unorganised women’s games that were scarcely reported on by local media to bring a whole community together and to raise vital funds to keep the strikes going viable. 

Somewhat inevitably though, once the people showed the power they held as a collective, the powers that be wanted to tear it down. 

This show of local strength and comradery scared the government and FA. The idea that local communities could come together and work for each other ignited fear of revolution and women getting ideas above their station so, later in 1921, the FA announced its ban on Women’s football. 

By the time of the 1926 general strike, football was still being used as a method of raising funds for striking workers. Due to the ban, however, this time it was the police organising games against workers, while women’s football in England slowly lost it’s the momentum that these working-class women had to build through their tireless fight against the ruling class. 

Fast forward to the modern women’s game and it’s unrecognisable. The commercialisation and rising cost of attending games provide a stark contrast to its working-class roots. But as we enter a new era, it does teach us the power that football holds and the importance of these clubs to local communities. 

Going back to Hayes’ comments about Women’s football being a “prawn sandwich girls club”, we must understand the context that they come from. Since the ban was lifted in 1971, Women’s football has been woefully underfunded and under-supported, so much so that it’s not been a realistic option for young girls to consider. Now that we are in another boom period for the game, though, it provides a chance for us to learn from the mistakes of our predecessors and build a footballing culture that truly represents both the people who play it and the people who support it. 

For those who support men’s football in England, this is all but gone at the highest level. Our clubs have been sold as merely a product for so long that the average working fan simply cannot afford to follow their club week-by-week, whether that be in person or on TV. 

Women’s football has a chance to fight back. For years it’s been seen as a ‘family-friendly’ alternative while ignoring its power to deliver football clubs back to the people. With the right funding and work put in, they can provide a platform for young, working-class players to make it to the highest level while maintaining low ticket prices and a communal spirit for the fans that has been so desperately lacking for years now. 

Ultimately, as fans, we must recognise and seize this opportunity. The women of the ‘Pea Soup Games’ showed over a hundred years ago the power that women’s football holds, we must now use that power to have football clubs that represent our local areas and allow us to feel part of a community again.

J Cardy

is a women’s football writer from York, now based in London. Find their twitter @JCardy7 or her WSL reporting on FromTheSpot.co.uk and her personal substack.