Yorkshire’s starring role in football drama
FOOTBALL MIGHT be on ice just now but a period drama about the early days of the beautiful game is winning over fans on television.
The English Game ,by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes, charts the rise of football in the Victorian age and much of it was filmed in Yorkshire.
Viewers may spot Broughton Hall, near Skipton, which was used for stately home scenes, while Saltaire stood in for the Lancashire town of Darwen.
The English Game is set in the 1870s and tells the story of the class conflict at the heart of the development of professional football.
It was filmed last summer. Several shops on Victoria Road in Saltaire were transformed into traditional Victorian grocers, butchers and bakers.
Scenes were also shot at Salts Mill and extras were pictured relaxing between takes.
The shoot then moved into Bradford and used both City Hall and the historic merchants’ district of Little Germany as backdrops.
Keighley Station, on the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway heritage line, also appears in the drama.
Other locations include Liverpool and Bolton, where a local football club was used for match scenes.
The English Game has two main characters who represent both sides of the class divide.
In the 19th century, the sport was dominated by teams of ‘old boys’ who had attended public schools such as Eton, Harrow and Charterhouse.
By the 1870s, factories and mills in the northern industrial cities began to field teams of employees.
However, they found themselves at a disadvantage, as the ‘gentlemen’ from the southern clubs had more leisure time in which to train, whereas the northern players worked long hours. The solution was to pay players, a controversial move at the time.
The English Game has two main characters who represent both sides of the class divide.