Soccer: illustration of the football game

Soccer is the English abbreviation for football, which has been spreading in several English-speaking countries. What is soccer literally? Like football – it is a team ball game, in the process of which players of one team must score as many goals in the net of another team. During the game, a player is allowed contact with the ball only by means of his feet or other parts of the body apart from the hands. Handball is allowed only to two players on the pitch, the goalkeepers, whose job is to protect their own goal. In other words, soccer differs from football, neither in rules nor in manner.

History of the soccer goes back to the mid XIX century. Soccer in English is a colloquial abbreviation of “association football”, which literally means football under the rules of the association. Such a long name for the kicking game was explained simply. The meaning of «by the rules of association» appears in order not to be confused with football, with a sport such as rugby, which was at that time popular in England. Later, a full and long name lost relevance. Only parts of the word “soc” added to it for soundness of the suffix “er” was used as the name.

To the word, rugby began to be called similarly – in English, this game sounds like “ragger”.

Given the fact that the game was played with feet has become widespread not only in Foggy Albion but also throughout continental Europe, the question of the name itself has been solved. The sport was no longer called soccer on an international level.

Canadian corporate soccer fan clubs

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History of soccer

In 1863 a few dozen leaders of various sports clubs gathered to establish unified rules for the game. The Football Association was formed, where the first item of discussion was “is it allowed to kick and tackle one’s opponents?” The answer was “no, you cannot”. But a few years later, in 1871, a meeting of other leaders of the new association was held where they discussed the creation of the newest game involving kicking – rugby.

From that time, the two varieties of the game began to be distinguished by their diminutive names – Rugby Football and Association Football. To simplify the names of the games, people have abbreviated them many times over. Rugby Football became a “rugger” and Association Football was simply called “soccer”.

It turns out that “soccer” is the same football that is called in some countries, which is not among the most famous sports. The term is particularly common in the United States of America (USA). There, “soccer” is called European football.

Most football fans are unflattered by the name “soccer”. They wonder why their beloved football is called by such an obscure name. But why be negative and say something negative about it? After all, there is nothing offensive about it. The reason is the simplest. In America, “football” is a completely different game – American football, which is their people’s sport. And for that reason, they had to call “regular football” by another name. They called it “soccer”.

Generally, the word “soccer” came from Great Britain. It was widely used there in the first half of the twentieth century. But it did not find its further widespread use until after the Second World War as the word “soccer” started to sound more American. This did not please the people of Britain. And, so the British in the eighties of the twentieth century began to slowly abandon the use of the word as it began to gain popularity in the United States.

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Soccer in Canada

In 1998, the teams were split into two conferences, East and West. As well as in hockey, baseball, and basketball.

And since 2006, the teams have been split into National and International Conferences.

What does soccer mean as a sport?

The rules of play are the same as in European football, adopted in the XIX century. The game of soccer has the following characteristic:

• Use of a standard size field for the game (105 x 68 meters);
• The same layout (central line divides the field into two halves, there are two penalty areas and two goalposts, on each face line standard-size goalposts are installed);
• Two teams will take part in the match, one of each of up to five men;
• Players can touch the ball with their feet, head, and other parts of the body (hands are forbidden);
• The goalkeeper takes position at the own goal. To protect against blows the goalkeepers are allowed to play with their hands within the penalty area;
• The game is played with a standard-sized ball;
• The goal is scored in the usual way. The team that scores the most goals is the winner;
• Penalty system is the same as in European football;
• Refereeing in the match is carried out by a team of referees (the head referee and two side referees on the lines).
• The results of the match are evaluated by the same system: victory – 3 points for the winning team; no result – 1 point for each team involved; defeat – 0 points.

Canadian soccer league

Professional soccer in Canada also consists of three clubs in membership with Major League Soccer (MLS), the top tier league of 24 teams founded in 1993 and based in the United States. The Canadian clubs are Montreal Impact, Toronto FC, and the Vancouver Whitecaps.