CONSEQUENCES

You don't have to look too far to find examples of consequences, where a decision to do or not do something impacts on something else. Sneeze, and someone else catches your cold. That sort of thing. Well, football is like that, too. In fact, if you look at it like that, virtually the whole of the modern game is the result, intended or unintended, of decisions taken much earlier.
Crossbars and nets were brought into being because of disputes over whether the ball had or had not crossed the line; and the offside rule came about because, in the very early days of the game, some bright spark came up with the idea of stationing a number of attackers on the opposing side's goalline, telling them to stay there. Ruination of the game beckoned, until some equally bright spark came up with the idea of offside.
There are comparatively modern changes which have also had significant consequences. Many years ago, at Carrow Road, the manager of a visiting London club declined to name his team, which duly came out for the kick-off against Norwich City with no-one in the crowd knowing who they were. I seem to remember that the London club's travelling Pressman, who was an embarrassed about it as anyone else, kindly put names to all the faces so that we could at least report what was happening, and more importantly, who was doing what.
Then another manager (was it the same one?) came up with the wheeze of changing all the numbers on his players' backs, or perhaps persuading the players to swap shirts. In those days, teams ran mostly on railway lines, straight and unchanging. No 2 was always the right-back, No 4 the right-half, and No 10 the inside-left. And so on. But he jumbled players and numbers, so that his outside-right took the field wearing not No 7 but No 6, and the left-back was No 8 not No 3. And so on. I don't remember who was the more flummoxed, visitors or home fans, but the consequences of both these abberrations was, eventually, a ruling that a team sheet had to be handed to the referee 30 minutes prior to kick-off.
The substitute saga is even better known, of course. When the rule was first introduced it was for one sub only, and a change to be made only if another player was injured and unable to continue. It was soon abused. If a manager wanted to make a change, then one of his players would feign injury in order to comply. The injury requirement had to go, and it did, so that a change could then be made at any time. But it opened the door for more and more subs, and in consequence there occurred a slow evolution from a team to a squad game.
So, what are we to make of recent attempts to introduce Premier League B teams, (a) because not enough young English players are getting enough games at a reasonable level, and (b) because many squad players are simply not getting enough outings? Could all this, I wonder, be a consequence of the decision, some years ago, and on economic grounds, I'm sure, to disband the Football Combination divisions?
In the 1950s, when some League clubs had very big staffs, the first team played in the Football League, the reserves (usually) in the Football Combination, and the A team (probably) in one of the local leagues, such as the old and fondly remembered Eastern Counties League. Everyone was happy, and everyone got regular, competitive games.
This sort of structure is probably too simplistic for today's requirements, but please don't say it is too expensive, because Premiership clubs could afford it. If they really wanted to.