1936 - The Pools War is Waged

Workers at an betting pool office. AOP

Revenue from the 28 football pools companies reaches nearly £30 million per annum. For every six million recorded postal packets sent in the UK every week, four million turn out to be those of pools entries. However, football pools go down like a lead balloon with the English Football League. They not only disrelish the idea but also decide to crush the industry by delaying publication of their fixture lists so pools companies are unable to print, distribute and collect coupons on time. This decision does not go down well with the companies that retaliate by printing coupons with only the home teams. They even manage to lay hands on unofficial leaks of the fixtures and make the best use of them to give customers enough time to send in their coupons. This Pools War comes to an end on 9 March after two weekends of the fixture lists being not published early. Another attempt to ban football pools is proposed soon after by R. J. Russell in Parliament. But the final nail in the coffin for such attempts is hammered on 3 April when the Bill is defeated by 287 votes from pools players to 24 from non-pools players. This is, however, only the beginning of a bigger war.