Off-Topic Forum

I was watching the highlights from the USA v. England Soccer match and the chant at the end of the match was "it's called soccer". Definitely, a huge milestone for USMT as we can punch our ticket to the knockouts with a win over Iran. I am not a soccer fan, however, I don't mind watching the World Cup. I just had that it is in the middle of Football season.

Soccer is actually an English word....

Something to do with early leagues in England....

Soccer isn't even that bad of a name for the sport - it is derived from the word sock, which is related to the foot and feet are used in the game. 

Be that as it may I *think* USA is the last country in the world still using the name soccer.

I know down here in New Zealand, we, along with Australia were one of the last to switch our official term for the sport from soccer to football but that was when I was a sports journalist about 15 years ago.

In the Spanish countries it is called futbol -- makes no sense because there is nothing about an actual foot in the name, which is "pie" in Spanish. And "bol" doesn't mean ball in Spanish, that is "pelota." Germany is foosball or something,and I am pretty sure it is not derived from the German word for foot or ball. Makes no sense and its lame to just convert the word "football" into how it would be pronounced in English with an accent. So we can say "SOCCER" lound and proud, and I will no longer take any more snide remarks from other countries about how we call it "soccer".

On a more serious note, I am thinking its entirely possible that the US can win the world cup within the next 30 years (basically within my lifetime). Just think that in 1992, the Dream Team straight up dominated every country by an insane margin, and it was just 10 years later that the world caught up in international competition. There are some things about World Cup international SOCCER that provide the US with a similar path to beat other more soccer-obsessed countries. The big professional leagues are becoming paramount and the big clubs don't want their players risking injury in games or practice with national teams, so there isn't that much time for the best players in other countries to be incorporated into cohesive national teams that would be commensurate or exploit the talent of the individual players (kind of like US in basketball). There is also the strategy of finding players who have grown up and played in other countries, but can nevertheless qualify for US citizenship for various reasons (parents born in US or something), and getting in on the US team early on can be appealing because it is a crap shoot whether they will ultimately make a national team in their "home" countries, and everyone still wants to make it big in US (I'm not saying they should want this, but I think there is this draw that I actually don't quite get because there are so many cool places and big markets in the world). Some may find that strategy off-putting, but I don't care, I'm pissed about basketball and I want to win in soccer now to get back.

Anyway, go USA!! We can do this!

I thought it was derived from the word association as in "association football".

It is.

However, Soccer a.k.a. called Football should not be confused with Australian style Football.

Yes, Australian rules Football, certainly does still maintain the "football" name in that country.

Other sports that employed football in their names down here did move away from the term though. The NZRFU (New Zealand Rugby Football Union) shortened its name to NZRU, dropping the football, in 2006 as did (as far as I am aware) all of our provincial unions.

The ARFU (Australian Rugby Football Union) actually shortened to ARU way back in 1997 — presumably to avoid confusion with the aforementioned Aussie rules football rather than soccer/football — and is now known as Rugby Australia. 

There is also Gaelic football that still uses the football term and I am sure there are probably other more obscure "footballs" I am not aware of.