5aside football’s has been one of the growth sports of the last two decades, to the point that now it is estimated that 5million people regularly play the sport.
But for something so popular its exact origins are something of a mystery. Originally it was played by Professional Teams in the UK and there were Arena Soccer Leagues in America. In England there were tournaments for pro teams as far back as the 1950s - London Teams were playing in the London Evening Standard Cup – which had a final at Wembley.
Millwall were particularly adept at this shorter form of the game down south, winning the title three times in six years in the late 1970s. This led to a number of other competitions down the years played by football league teams – one incarnation was sponsored by Guinness and won by Manchester United.
The trend for 5 a side to be shown on TV continues to this day with The Masters Football Tournament involving former players is shown now on Sky Sports.
However over the last couple of decades 5 a side football has become “social football” and is played in large numbers not by professional players, but by ordinary members of the public.
5aside football really began to be played by non professionals in the 1970s and it wasn’t until wasn’t until the early 1980s when leagues started to spring up, primarily in the Midlands in the UK as groups of Leisure Centre Managers noticed how popular their new 5 a side courts had become.
It was then they decided to play matches against the sets of teams at all their centres and soon the first commercial 5 a side leagues in the world were born. And Leisure Leagues became the first 5 a side football company providing leagues to the community.
The 1980s were dark times for football generally, with Heysel, Hillsborough and hooliganism casting dark shadows over the 11 aside version of the sport, but as the 1990s dawned there was an unprecedented boom in interest in the game.
The Wold Cup in Italy in 1990 became synonymous with English heartbreak and Gazza’s tears, the Premier League came along in a blaze of Sky TV publicity and all of a sudden the game became “cool” again. 
This of course had a knock-on affect to the 5 a side game. Leisure Leagues were expanding their business in the Midlands and they were followed by other companies from the Yorkshire and in the South, all of whom were able to cash in on the proliferation of Astroturf facilities that were being built around the UK.
The Internet and changing ways of communication were of great benefit to all these companies, and they were able to reach far-flung areas of the country and bring the concept of community 5 a side to every corner of the British Isles.
Leisure Leagues and the rest worked on a very specific model, which saw them rent facilities such as schools and Leisure Centres to run their leagues, and this led to a number of firms spotting a gap in the market and building their own Venues. These purpose built venues sprung up all around the UK and are also used to host corporate events and children’s parties.
Recently there has been the formation of a number of National Events which aimed to bring all these teams together to play. The most prestigious of these is the National Small sided Football Tournament, which is held every year and attracts hundreds of teams who play for big prizes.
The great thing about 5 a side football is it is a great “leveller,” anyone can play the sport regardless of their abilities as a footballer. There is a five a side league to suit everyone.
Some of the companies – Leisure Leagues for example – allow mixed teams, while others run specific ladies leagues. There are more and more advances in Astroturf technology so largely gone are the sand-burns of the past! A lot of the surfaces these leagues are played on are like grass and bare very little resemblance to the pitches at QPR, Luton and Preston which created so much furore in the 1980s when Football League Matches were played on those surfaces.
Indeed, it is the 11-a-side game, predominantly on Sunday Mornings that is arguably the only area of British life that has not been enriched by the 5 a side game. As peoples lifestyles change they find it more convenient to play a half hour game of 5 a side than they do to play a full 90 minute game.
5 a side football has a far longer history than people think, but it is far from ready to be consigned to the past. One of the most buoyant sports in the UK it has exploded in the last few decades and will continue to thrive in the future.
