Wales Football – The Early Years...

The real first match Wales played was in March of 1876 against Scotland, which was is the 3rd oldest football team in the world. Although Scotland did win the first bout, another bout was scheduled in Wales the next year. That was the first in the international football bouts in Welsh at The Racecourse Ground at Wrexham in March of 1877. Scotland won 2–0.

The first match for Wales’ and England was in 1879 a 2-1 win at Kennington Oval, London and then in 1882 Wales played Ireland succeeding 7-1 in Wrexham.  The associations of the four Home Nations gathered in Manchester in December of 1882 to create the rules. This meeting was the creation of the International Football Association Board and the ability to make change to these rules is a job that they still do.

The British Home Championship began in the 1883-1884 season, which was a tournament that was played once a year with England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales. Wales was the winner on 12 different occasions, winning seven times and sharing the win on five.

The FAW joined FIFA, world football’s governing unit, back in 1906, however the relationship with FIFA and the British associations was not good and the British nations left the FIFA in the 1920s in an argument over payments to it amateur members.

The result was Wales didn’t join in the first 3 World Cups.

Ryan Giggs...

Ryan Giggs was a Welsh footballer who had played for Manchester United throughout his entire career. He started out in a left winger position in the 1990s and remained there far into the 2000s however,recently he played in a more in depth role in playmaking.

Giggs holds several records, even as the most honored player in the English football history.  He was the first to collect the 11 English league medals. Giggs was even the very first to win 2 PFA Young Player of the Year awards consecutively and is also the only one to have both scored and played in every season of Premier League since its creation.

Giggs has a long continental and domestic career and is the very first player within the UEFA Champions League to score in 12 seasons back to back, as well as being elected to the PFA Team of the Century back in 2007, the English Premier League Team of the Decade back in 2003, also the FA Cup Team of the Century. Ryan is the only Man United player to play in all 11 Premier League teams that won and all 3 League Cup teams that won. In the UEFA Champions League Final of 2008, Giggs beat Bobby Charlton’s record of over 757 appearances in the Manchester United and became the all time club leader.

Internationally, Giggs played on the national Welsh team before he retired from football on, and he was the youngest player to epitomize his country. As well as many honors Giggs has gotten in football, he was appointed OBE for the Queen’s 2007 Birthday Honors List, and inducted to the English Football Hall of Fame.