ABSTRACT
During the 1930s the national game continued to be administered by two essentially conservative national bodies, the Football Association (FA) and the Football League. At the international level the FA’s apparent priority was to keep the national team sheltered from the rapidly developing and improving game as played in other countries. Having left FIFA twice during the 1920s, the FA and its counterparts in the other home countries ensured that none of them played any role in the World Cup championships, which started in the 1930s. England, for example, played the other home countries every year and occasionally played other European national teams, such as Germany or Italy, notably during end-of-season continental tours. This relatively isolationist policy protected the image of British football in general, and English football in particular, as being the best in the world (something that was to change significantly after the Second World War).
