A FRESH discovery could re-write the history of women's football in Wales.

Women's football is currently on the rise in Wales with the national team narrowly failing to qualify for the World Cup in Australia which is currently being played.

However the story of women's football in Wales began during World War One.

A newly discovered team picture of the Powysland Ordnance Factory team reveals a women's football club was founded in Welshpool in 1914, providing recreation for the workers of the factory.

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However the end of the war brought about an end to the emerging women's game in Wales and in 1922 the Football Association of Wales imposed a total ban which would set the sport back decades.

Not all football enthusiasts followed the FAW doctrine and just weeks after the ban was imposed a women's charity match in Cardiff raised £15,000 for the restoration of Reims Cathedral.

County Times: Llanidloes Town Ladies in 1945.

Llanidloes Town Ladies in 1945.

Remarkably the FAW doubled down on their ban in 1939, decreeing 'no football match in which any lady or ladies take part in any way whatsoever shall be permitted to be played on any football ground within the jurisdiction of this association.'

The ban was once again lifted during World War Two when the women of Wales once again stepped up to fill the void left by men fighting the Nazi's in Europe.

Llanidloes Town Football Club ran a women's team which was still in existence in 1945 to play a fundraiser match and herald to the return of Britain's triumphant troops.

However the FAW soon imposed the ban on women's football which endured until 1970 when the association finally relented and lifted the ban which had been so unpopular for so long.