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I can't agree that football is centuries old. Football (not the american one) stemmed from the sport similar to rugby (played with both feet and hands).
It was invented in England in second half of the 19th century and soon popularized in south america by some Englishmen. The sport soon evolved to foot-only.
Of course americans hijacked the word and declared their own rugby-ripoff a football (name probably inspired by the same predecessor of "euro"-football or by the fact that free kicks are shot with a foot)
Although it sounds a bit strange that so simple foot-based sport didn't exist earlier (hint: even ancient Romans had something similar, archeologists found sculptures of football-like balls from that time).
Dooh...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football#Medi.C3.A6val_football
Earlist record of football match is from 1712. Football (played with foot) was banned in 1409 by Henry IV of England.
Before engaging in discussions, a bit of research are a good idea.




Member since:
2005-10-02
In the rest of the world football == soccer.
In Denmark the word is "fodbold".
If we're talking about american football (aka perverted rugby), the word we use is "amerikansk football". Because your football isn't football.
According to Wikipedia soccer is known as football outside the US, and the US is only one nation of hundreds.
Besides that football did exist long before 1863. 1863 is the year of the official beginning. Football as a game have existed for several centuries (the same goes for hockey). Spelling and rules have changed through the years, and keeps changing, but the fact is that football as we know it (outside USA) is centuries old.