The lack of structure to the football landscape in 1888 meant that many matches were being cancelled due to bad weather, injuries or lack of transport. With fixture cards being rendered virtually meaningless William McGregor, a Midlands based draper and a Director of Aston Villa, set about making changes.

The Scot wrote to a handful of clubs and all of the teams he contacted agreed there was a need for something more organised and a meeting took place at Anderton's Hotel in Fleet Street, London on 22nd March 1888, a second meeting followed on April 17th in Manchester when the official plans were put in place.

There were an initial 12 teams invited to join The League, six from Lancashire - Preston, Bolton, Everton, Burnley, Accrington Stanley and Blackburn Rovers with the other six coming from the Midlands - Aston Villa, West Brom, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Notts County, Derby County and Stoke City.

The reason that all the founder members came from the North West or the Midlands was that at the time there was no professional football being played south of Birmingham.

The first programme of league matches took place on September 8th 1888, with Preston North End winning the first league title without losing a game. Four years after the birth of The League the interest had grown dramatically and a second division was introduced and by 1920 there was also a Third Division (South) before the Northern equivalent was introduced a year later.

Up until 1992 the Football League Division One was the top level of English football but then the top 22 clubs broke away to form the FA Premier League.

Football as we know it today has evolved massively over the years, automatic promotion and relegation replaced 'Test' matches (play-offs) in 1898 before Play-Offs were reintroduced in 1987 for the third or fourth promotion places.

The Football League is currently enjoying one of its most entertaining season's with crowds set to break the 16m barrier for the third consecutive season. There are exciting promotion and relegation scraps in all three divisions and in the Championship there are as many as 13 clubs still in with a chance of promotion to the Premier League with just three weekends of the season left. Additionally, Championship club Cardiff City will feature in this season's FA Cup Final.

So here's to another successful 120 years.

For more information about the 120th anniversary of The Football League please visit:

http://www.football-league.premiumtv.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10794~1291449,00.html