As any football fan will no doubt be aware, Cambridge occupies an important place in the history of the beautiful game. The Cambridge Rules, drawn up at the university in 1848 by a group of students looking to standardise various public school versions of the game, were the forerunners of modern association football’s code of play. The Rules are currently commemorated on a plaque in Parker’s Piece – the hallowed turf upon which the original documenters played – and are due to be further immortalised next year through a granite monument replacing the current offering.

The monument itself has been the subject of some controversy, provoking the ire of townsfolk. “£115k for a block of granite” laments one online commenter. Others lambast the so-called “PC brigade”, whose opposition to the original design – a statue of a white male referee – was apparently influential in the commission of a revised blueprint. All criticism aside, let's take a look at the history behind the statue and its bearing on modern day football.

Football has long been a popular pastime in Cambridge. The famous matches/brawls of old that worried kings and politicians alike took place in the university town as well as villages out in the countryside. One match played at Chesterton in 1579 between townspeople and university students was so violent and disruptive that it compelled the Vice-Chancellor to forbid the playing of the game – “foteball” as it was referred to then – outside of college grounds. Although it would be 284 years until the Football Association was formed, the authorities clearly felt a need to intervene when on-pitch antics were deemed to be getting out of hand. The next time you see the things getting a little heated on the pitch, it will be amusing to think that not so much has changed in 450 years after all.

Despite the decree banning these public displays, the sport continued to gain popularity in Cambridge, and by the 1800s students playing variants of the modern game were commonly observed at Parker’s Piece, the town’s largest green expanse and a natural arena. However in order for proper matches to be arranged between colleges, somebody needed to draw up a set of rules; people played different versions of the game depending on their respective backgrounds. For example, the Rugby boys allowed for handling of the ball and backward passing in their game, whilst the Eton contingent placed emphasis on dribbling and an offside rule even more confusing than the one in place today.

As it turned out, the two to come up with a unifying doctrine – the so-called “Cambridge Rules” – were Henry de Winton and John Charles Thring, alumni of Shrewsbury School and students of the university. They formed a football team with an assortment of Old Etonians and, in 1848, held a meeting at Trinity College to determine what the standard rubric of football would be. The resulting document has now been lost, but a set of rules dating from 1856 still survives.

The basic elements of the game that would go on to become association football are there, although there are some interesting differences. For example, the rules state that after a goal is scored each side should swap ends, “unless a previous arrangement be made to the contrary”. Minimal handling of the ball also remains; it was not until October 1863 with a revision of the original Rules that this element was done away with. Still, the regulations will be familiar to the modern player – the offside rule appearing in the formulation “No player is allowed to loiter between the ball and the adversaries' goal.”

The game has come a long way from a bunch of Etonians lobbing a ball about on Parker’s Piece, but it is important not to forget the humble beginnings of what is now a multi-billion pound global industry. Before it was exported across the world, the sport was nurtured by the entrepreneurial young students of Cambridge. We perhaps forget that a town which has given so much to the intellectual fibre of our world also made a huge contribution to one of the world's most widely-held passions: kicking a ball across a field. In a month in which the FA Cup sees Cambridge United host goliaths Manchester United at the modest Abbey Stadium, that is surely something worth celebrating.