http://www.onlyagame.org/2009/11/on-sunday-get-ready-for-some-football/ Sports, NPR Style Fri, 19 Mar 2010 02:13:52 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 http://www.onlyagame.org/2009/11/on-sunday-get-ready-for-some-football/comment-page-1/#comment-222 Vanya Fri, 20 Nov 2009 03:29:51 +0000 http://www.onlyagame.org/?p=2774#comment-222 FYI, the "rest of the world" doesn't call the sport "football." And that tone of condescension is something we soccer fans really need to avoid if we want to win more converts in the US. In Italy, a country that can claim some familiarity with the game, it's called "calcio" which translates as "kick." In Irish "sacar", to distinguish it from their native football (or as of today "the French cheating game"). In Japanese "sakkaa". In Spanish, yes, it's called "futbol" but of course in Spanish those are nonsense syllables just like "soccer" is in English. Ironically "soccer" is British slang in the first place, short for "Association Football". And really soccer is a more accurate and helpful designation - it helps distinguish Association Football from the many, many other variants of football in the world - Rugby, American, Gaelic, Australian, etc. etc. If anything we Americans should be lecturing the English to go back to using soccer as the term of choice. When the US finally wins a World Cup I'll be proud to cheer our soccer team, not our football team. FYI, the “rest of the world” doesn’t call the sport “football.” And that tone of condescension is something we soccer fans really need to avoid if we want to win more converts in the US. In Italy, a country that can claim some familiarity with the game, it’s called “calcio” which translates as “kick.” In Irish “sacar”, to distinguish it from their native football (or as of today “the French cheating game”). In Japanese “sakkaa”. In Spanish, yes, it’s called “futbol” but of course in Spanish those are nonsense syllables just like “soccer” is in English. Ironically “soccer” is British slang in the first place, short for “Association Football”. And really soccer is a more accurate and helpful designation – it helps distinguish Association Football from the many, many other variants of football in the world – Rugby, American, Gaelic, Australian, etc. etc. If anything we Americans should be lecturing the English to go back to using soccer as the term of choice. When the US finally wins a World Cup I’ll be proud to cheer our soccer team, not our football team.

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