Why did early football teams play with five forwards?

Football began as a game of attackers. In the early days, most players on a team had attacking jobs, whereas modern teams split their players much more evenly between defenders, midfielders and forwards. The very first international match, England against Scotland on 30 November 1872, shows how lopsided it was: England sent out seven or eight forwards, and Scotland six.

England's style was all about individual excellence and dribbling. Scotland did something that surprised them: they actually passed the ball among players. The result, ironically, with so many attackers on the pitch, was a 0–0 draw.

Out of that chaos came the first formation that lasted. Football's first long-term successful formation was recorded in 1880. It was called the Pyramid, and only later given numbers, 2–3–5: two full-backs, three half-backs and five forwards, counted from the back. By the 1890s it was England's standard and had spread across the world.

Its genius was balance. For the first time, attack and defence were shared out. When the other team attacked, the three half-backs met the forwards first, and the full-backs were the last line of defence. The centre half-back did two jobs at once: he helped organise his own side's attack and marked the opposing centre forward.

It lasted a long time. Uruguay won the 1924 and 1928 Olympics and the 1930 World Cup with it, and it even left a mark you can still see on shirts: the habit of numbering them up from the back and the right.