For me it has to be the balls themselves which allow a huge degree of precision to be attained, and at times the speed of thought which training and observation have brought to the game but as for excitement and one to one combats well that has largely disappeared. The appliance of science has made it less of a spectacle.

The pitches mainly. Make for much better football.

We are good.

A former work colleague of mine, in the 1960's played for Wolverhampton Wanderers. Though he was there 8 years he never made a first team call up. Playing all his senior football for the reserves.
We had a chat once and we each had to pick 10 things that has made the game faster/better today.....Both of us listed the modern ball and the improvement in the playing surface. Interested if anyone out there wants to add their others.

3 points for a win has brought some exciting finishes that 2 points didn't have.

Pitches make for samey football nothing like a bit of grease on the top or the proverbial quagmire, like cricket football has lost a lot of variety, a much more predictable game.

Toilets that don't give you cholera e.g. longside
More substitutes
4th official
Goal line technology
Fitter players
Play offs keeping the season alive

Not that much to be honest. Pitches were muddy but at least it was a 'level' playing field. No pundits, cameras everywhere and I don't think I ever heard Harry Potts speak nor any of our players. There was an air of 'mystery' surrounding the game then but now we are submerged in facts,statistics and 'chancers' and opportunists. Ah, those were the days!

Play offs as long as you win them.

I must admit that I don't miss getting soaked to the skin on the Bee Hole or Burnden Park Railway End, or Rochdale's sh*tty embankment !

Being able to take the kick off backwards.

It would be interesting if a comparable thread of things we do not like about modern football.

I agree with the better pitches and the balls

I would add the no back pass rule
Technology -kit design, boots etc
Fitness - modern day footballers, are more like athletes.
The changes made to the tackling laws, tackle from behind being outlawed.
Vanishing spray- where would we be with out it
Stadia and the facilities that go with them
Access to tv and internet streams of virtually every game, especially involving Burnley

Accessibility, I like how every PL game is televised so I can watch the 3 o clock games.

Thank goodness we've got rid of all the diving, cheating , feigning injuries, obscene transfer fees, managerial tantrums, biased reporting, poor treatment of fans, foreign owners and incompetent referees.

Yes, all of that is in the past and its a much better game now.

Pitches
Stadia
Tackle from behind banned
Hooliganism pretty much erradicated
No place in the modern game for hatchet men like Norman Hunter
Sean Dyche

I remember the days before substitutes. When a player was injured, he was put on the wing as a "passenger" or had to leave the field, depending on the severity of the injury. So a team was penalised for having an injured player due, in most parts, to a thug of an opponent causing the imbalance.