Az első cipőzsinórnál kezdődött… A magyar hivatásos futball születése
It all began with the first Shoe Ties… The birth of Professional Hungarian Football

Summary/Abstract: The first professional football championship in Hungary was organized in 1926, which was altogether the fifth in the world after England, Scotland, Austria and Czechoslovakia. This branch of sport started conquering Hungary (and Central Europe) around the end of the 19th century. In the beginning, football players were not paid by their clubs – however, as football rapidly gained popularity, clubs, in order to raise the already high number of spectators and their own incomes, gave officially amateur (pseudo-amateur) players diverse benefits. Although there are examples of professionalism from before the First World War, besides football violence, the amateur–professional contest was the most important subject in Hungarian football after 1919. This essay is concerned with the regulation of the transfer of players, the (illegal) incomes of players, detection of pseudo-amateurs and the role international games played in the development of professionalism. Finally, the paper also touches upon the question of bets and presents renowned cases of stew.

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