The rise in popularity saw the building of huge stadia to house the expanding crowds of spectators, again primarily in the industrial centres,

"in 1900 Glasgow was the third biggest city in Europe after London and Paris and within its boundaries it contained the three largest football stadia in the world - Ibrox, Celtic Park and Hampden Park" (Forsyth, 1990, p32).

Interest in football continued to soar, and after the interruption of the First World War, the game entered its halycon days, as phenomenal attendances were registered at football matches. The Empire Stadium was built at Wembley, and played host to the 1923 FA Cup Final, but its capacity of 127,000 could not match that of Hampden Park in Glasgow, for many years the biggest stadium in the world, which still holds the European record attendance of 150,000 (1937) (Forsyth, 1990, p32). The fact that so many working-class spectators were prepared to pay to watch football, even in the years of the depression 1930-32, illustrates the pulling power of the sport.

War once again halted competitive football, indeed many players served in the conflict, although considerable efforts were made to continue as much as possible, in what would appear to be an effort to keep morale high (Nawart & Hutchings, 1995, p69), despite the devastation of several grounds by German bombers, most notably in Southampton and Clydebank. The end of hostilities in Europe saw an immediate return to football, first with an impromptu FA Cup for 1946-47, followed the next season by a full League programme. Again there were bumper crowds, as before the war, and several of the stadia were beginning to creak under the strain, with a disaster at Bolton and a near miss at Chelsea. Injuries sustained watching football matches were not uncommon, due to the crushed and cramped conditions on the terraces, which accounted for almost all of the grounds, with seats being out of the price range of the ordinary supporter.

The 1950s and 60s proved to be superlative for British football, and saw club successes in European tournaments, and England lifted the World Cup in 1966 at Wembley Stadium, due in no small way to a large partisan crowd and a highly contentious goal. The 1970s however saw a sea-change in the popularity of football.

Attendances at football matches began to decrease, and the spectre of hooliganism that had begun in the 1960s loomed ever larger, both trends that were to continue well into the 1980s. The fall in crowds proved puzzling,

"Taken for granted for a century, the supporters disappeared as mysteriously as herring shoals by the middle of the 1970s"
(Forsyth, 1990, p214).

One possible explanation is the rise in television coverage, allowing more fans to watch from the comfort of their armchair, instead of braving the elements on terraces that had seen little modernisation since being built many decades previous. The riotous behaviour of the fans ultimately led to the exclusion of English teams from European Club Competitions in 1985 after the Heysel disaster in Belgium, and the antiquated design of many stadia led to several other fatal disasters (Ibrox 1971, Bradford 1985, Hillsborough 1990).

The European ban was lifted in 1990, and the Hillsborough disaster resulted in the implementation of all-seater stadium, both events instrumental in the renaissance of football that we are currently experiencing. Indeed, sell-out crowds are once again a common sight, particularly at the two biggest clubs in Britain, Glasgow Rangers and Manchester United, both of whom suffered heavily from supporters apathy in the early 1980s and struggled to fill their huge grounds. However this is not impressive as it first appears, as due to restrictive safety regulations and the introduction of seats, grounds such as Ibrox Park (home of Rangers) which once held 120,000 now hold merely 46,000. Manchester United's Old Trafford is currently undergoing rebuilding to increase its capacity to 55,000, making it the largest club stadium in Britain, but in 1939 it could play host to over 76,000 spectators (Robinson, 1993, p56). Of course not all clubs regularly experience sell-out crowds, even in the Premiership, but one notable anomaly is Southampton, whose ground is the smallest in the top division (15,200), where for most matches it is difficult to obtain a ticket, despite the team not hailing from a traditional footballing stronghold.

Central to football's recent re-birth is the assimilation of the game into popular, or ‘pop', culture. Although this happened to a lesser extent in previous decades, notably with stars such as Manchester United's George Best and Arsenal's Charlie George, the latter of whom actually attempted a sideline career as a ‘glam rock' singer. In the 1990s there is a much stronger association with footballers as pop stars, notably in the cases of Ryan Giggs, Lee Sharpe (both Manchester United), and Liverpool's Jamie Redknapp, all of whom enjoy a large following of pre-pubescent females, perhaps explaining in part the recent rise in female spectators. The portrayal of footballers as young, healthy, virile young males is linked to ancient tribal rituals, some have argued (Morris, 1981). This notion of a football match as a tribal ritual, either as ‘hunt', a ‘stylized battle', or as a ‘status display' (Morris, 1981, pp15-22), accounts for the rise of football's popularity as a mass spectator sport as fulfilling a deeply ingrained psychological desire to keep the tribal traditions of our ancient ancestors.