Early history[edit]

PSSI was established by Soeratin Sosrosoegondo, who graduated from Harvard and returned

to Indonesia in 1928. He became the first Indonesian to work at his company, a Dutch enterprise
in Yogyakarta. He later resigned from the company and became more active in
the revolutionary movement.
To accomplish his mission, Soeratin held many meetings with Indonesian professional football
players, mostly through personal contacts because they wanted to avoid the Dutch police. Later, at a
meeting that was held in Jakarta with Soeratin, the head of Voetbalbond Indonesische Jakarta (VIJ),
and other players, the group decided to establish a national football organisation. On 19 April 1930,
almost all non-national organisations, such as VIJ Jakarta, BIVB Bandung, Perserikatan Sepakraga
Mataram (PSM), IVBM Magelang, VVB Solo, MVB Madiun, and SIVB Surabaya gathered at the final
meeting and established Persatoean Sepak Raga Seloeroeh Indonesia (Football Association of
Indonesia or PSSI) with Soeratin as the first leader. [vague]
In PSSI's earlier years, football was used to resist the Dutch control of the colonies by gathering all
the footballers.[citation needed] In 1936, when PSSI became stronger, NIVB was changed to Nederlandsh
Indische Voetbal Unie (NIVU, meaning "Football Union of Dutch East Indies") and cooperation with
the Dutch began. In 1938, with "Dutch East Indies national football team" as their name, NIVU sent
their team to the 1938 FIFA World Cup at France. At the time, most of the players came from NIVU
instead of PSSI, and there were nine players of Chinese origin. As a result, Soeratin expressed his
protest since he wanted a match between NIVU and PSSI before the FIFA World Cup. In addition,
he was also disgraced because the flag that was used at the World Cup matches involving the Dutch
East Indies was the Dutch flag. Soeratin then cancelled the agreement with NIVU at the PSSI
congress in 1939 in Solo.

Japanese occupation[edit]
When the Japanese armies came to Indonesia, the PSSI became inactive because Japan classified
it as a Taiikukai (体育会)(Japanese sport association).