On a side note, I really wish they would name football by its proper name: football, not soccer. To the billions of people who follow it globally that's the name of the sport.
I remember going to a Superbowl party with some coworkers, and one of em absolutely blew me away with their game knowledge. I've never enjoyed a Superbowl party as much as that one. He was making tons of calls and explaining everything in a really friendly and approachable way. It was impossible to not be at the edge of your seat as you watched each play being made.
I'm pretty sure this also extends to eSports, like StarCraft 2. Since I was pretty hooked on the game I watched tons of games and I understood the game pretty well for a few years. A lot of my sports-loving friends were pretty skeptical of the whole "eSports" thing, but they became true believers when I invited em over and gave me play by play explanations of what was going on.
I had a similar experience and it's really nice, you realise you miss so much of the actual game if you just follow the ball blindly. That being said it's still enjoyable.
Cheers to all the people who take the time to explain the game like that to others!
Things are named and pronounced differently in different languages.
The fact is, "football" was already taken in the American vocabulary by the time soccer rose to popularity in the US.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football#Establishment_of_mode...
source: http://ns.umich.edu/Releases/2014/June14/Its-football-not-so...
The UK has a lot of slang. Soccer is a slang term sometimes used in informal settings.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskUK/comments/8rnuyh/older_users_i...
- American Football
- Canadian Football
- Gaelic Football
- Aussie Rules Football
- Rugby Union
- Rugby League
There are a lot of (related) sports called football. The English shortened Association to Soccer and the name stuck in The States, Canada and other places. It's just as proper as football.
https://www.britannica.com/story/why-do-some-people-call-foo...
As a result, a great deal of the actions you will see will be necessarily improvisory - which makes those moments of rare brilliance all the more amazing. Especially given the stakes often at hand during these moments.
If something like gymnastics is like classical music recitals, then football is like jazz music ensemble
Again, it's petty, but I'm English and it's a pet peeve of mine.
Soccer is an English term invented in the 19th century. It spread to a number of Anglosphere countries in a similar manner to all sorts of words from 19th century England. It is currently used in Canada, the US, Ireland[1], South Africa, Australia, New Zealand etc.
The idea that soccer is an "Americanism" simultaneously requires you to believe that (a) that only Americans use the term and (b) that Americans are ignorant of the rest of the world.
The reality, of course, is that these countries are using a term that has existed for over a century and is a borrowed word from England. Each of these countries have a prominent sport containing the word football(various rugby codes, american football, gaelic sports), and therefore it was convenient to retain the term soccer.
This, of course, does not jive very well with lazy anti-Americanism however, which generally seems to be the point of the exercise.
[1] I know, I know.
The core point is that while there are regional differences none of those countries have anywhere near the same level of media influence as America, so yes, it is an Americanism like it or not. And when writing an article literally about Football for an international audience published on the internet then just call it by its name not the regional one used locally. It seems lazy not to.
Anyway it's just a pet peeve of mine (and plenty of others), it doesn't have to be logical.
The vast majority of takes on the Internet about the word soccer are lazy anti-Americanism. I accept that it's just a pet peeve for you, but I was addressing the general discourse on the term.
With regards to 538 using the term soccer, it is explicitly an American website. 538 is the number of electors in the US electoral college. The majority of readers are American, therefore it seems reasonable to use the term soccer.
You could argue that they should just use the term football and have the reader infer from context which sport it is, but then we wouldn't be having this discussion if you thought that was an acceptable solution :P
As a Melburnian I take a passing interest every 4 years in the 'Socceroos' but we have our own code that dates back to the 1850s, with influences from the indigenous game of "Marngrook". Footy is footy, soccer is soccer and we find labels such as the 'world game' or 'beautiful game' rather quaint.
Be aware that your language prescriptivism can be seen as a form of cultural imperialism.
Your country is not the world or the universe, even if everyday language indicates that. Language use seems to affect subconscious behavior, even if not intended.
Anyway, my point is, you have been manipulated through your language.
Someone in /r/BritishProblems called a zebra crossing a "crosswalk" the other day and as an en-gb native I couldn't help but be scandalised! ;o)
It was in Oxford, where both Rugby and Association football are commonly played at the university level, that the term soccer came up, as an abbreviation of “association”, in the same vein as rugby football is referred to as rugger — the -er ending is a common form of local slang, and is why Boris Johnson is often referred to as Bozzer.
Soccer isn't called that because of American football, the name "soccer" arose in UK where lots of towns have their own style of football game. It obviously caught on as a name in USA because they also have a naming conflict.
I too hate the name soccer, because of what I had inculcated in to me as a child.
The more interesting question is why rugby football is called football. But I guess, in modern parlance, it often isn't.
In most languages, it is not called football, and is also neither a combination of foot and ball.
Australians are under the Australian monarchy, which is not the same monarchy as the UK.
The same monarch, but not the same monarchy.
That said local soccer teams tend to call themselves Football clubs use the initials FC. The local soccer team where I live is "Sydney FC".
I will say A-League games are pretty good to go to the atmosphere at live games is a lot better than Rugby League games. The crowd really gets into it. My friend is a season ticket holder and he drags me along to A-League games semi-regularly and even sitting in the members area at the matches is pretty good.