Post by plainmoorpete on Mar 25, 2023 13:53:56 GMT
I wonder if Jon , or anyone else could help me with a question I have been pondering on for some time.
I may be mistaken but I always assumed that Torquay Town and Babbacombe merged in 1921 so as to create a professional football club that could rival the likes of Exeter City and Plymouth Argyle.
But what was actually meant by "professional"?
In Victorian times the fight for professionalism was so that working class sportsmen could receive broken time payments to compensate for lost wages, that definition would imply by today's standards that those players were aspiring to semi-professional status, ie receiving money for playing but still relying on their day job for their main income. Nevertheless the staunch amateur ethos of the governing bodies resisted even that.
Now by the beliefs of those 19th century amateurs even the likes of say Dulwich Hamlet today would be regarded as professionals. So my question is was the Torquay United of 1921, playing in the Southern League, full time or part time professional?
The reason I ask is because with all the talk of TUFC returning to a part time league and the possibility of us becoming part time would this mark an existential break with our history?
I may be mistaken but I always assumed that Torquay Town and Babbacombe merged in 1921 so as to create a professional football club that could rival the likes of Exeter City and Plymouth Argyle.
But what was actually meant by "professional"?
In Victorian times the fight for professionalism was so that working class sportsmen could receive broken time payments to compensate for lost wages, that definition would imply by today's standards that those players were aspiring to semi-professional status, ie receiving money for playing but still relying on their day job for their main income. Nevertheless the staunch amateur ethos of the governing bodies resisted even that.
Now by the beliefs of those 19th century amateurs even the likes of say Dulwich Hamlet today would be regarded as professionals. So my question is was the Torquay United of 1921, playing in the Southern League, full time or part time professional?
The reason I ask is because with all the talk of TUFC returning to a part time league and the possibility of us becoming part time would this mark an existential break with our history?