Football (word)

Football (word)

The English language word football may mean any one of several team sports (or the ball used in that respective sport), depending on the national or regional origin and location of the person using the word.

Where English is a first language the unqualified use of the word football is used to refer to the most popular code of football in that region. The sports most frequently referred to as simply football are association football, American football, Australian rules football, Canadian football, Gaelic football, rugby league football and rugby union football.

Of the 45 national FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) affiliates in which English is an official or primary language, 43 use football in their organisations' official names (only Canada and the United States use soccer). Soccer has been the prevailing term for association football in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, where other codes of football are dominant. The term used for association football is going through a period of transition in recent times. In 2005, Australia's association football governing body changed its name from soccer to football to align with the general international usage of the term. In 2006, New Zealand decided to follow suit citing "the international game is called football".

There are also many other languages where the common term for association football uses a phonetically similar word to the English term football. (See the Names for association football article.)