Before the Bright Star: football in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan

South Sudan’s independence was accompanied by the creation of a new national football team and its entry into the Federation of International Football Association (FIFA). Despite Sudan’s football history, there has not been much inquiry into the game’s growth and importance in Southern Sudan. This article analyzes football’s development in Southern Sudan during the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium era (1899–1956). In Northern Sudan it was featured in Khartoum’s Gordon College and the Sudan Football Association. In the South, football was played at Christian mission sites; locations that aimed to challenge the spread of Islam. As the British sought to separate the North from the South, the encouragement of football in each region was a point of unity in a divisive colonial agenda; one that planted seeds of conflict for the postcolonial state.