Football or soccer? What’s the right term anyway?

Football fans all around the world, alongside in Europe are synonymous for their love of the term — football. It's after all the continent where football is the undisputed number one sport, with England being the birthplace of the game. So, it can be understandable if the rest of the world also follows suit and practically sneers at anyone who uses the term, soccer.

But here's the real kicker, the term soccer actually originated in England itself! Several British institutions began playing their own forms of "football" in the early 1800s, each with its own set of regulations. After the Football Association was established in 1863, 15 years after the rules were created at Cambridge, to promote the game, a different variation became known as 'association football', and soccer was coined from "association football". The root of the word 'soccer' lies with the students of the University of Oxford, where "rugger'' was used to refer to rugby football and "assoccer" to mean association football. The latter term was further shortened to "soccer". It was around in the 1980s that people in England stopped using the term soccer as it was almost exclusively associated with the American fan base at that point. 

So, even though this term originated in England itself, it can be said it's pretty much an American term now, although it's also used in Canada and Australia. Over the years this has made for some interesting and fun banters, with fan bases often calling out each other to set the right term. A recent ad of Frito-Lay featuring the legendary David Beckham poked fun at the entire concept of this 'football vs. soccer' debate.

With this year's FIFA World Cup featuring England and USA in the same group, it was thought ultimately this will be the match that will crown the 'victor', of who gets to have the bragging rights for calling the sport by its right name, memes were doing round in the social media that if USA wins, their star player Christian Pulisic will pull up his jersey to reveal 'its soccer' tagline! While the British fans were looking forward to showing their USA counterparts how the game of football is played and called.

Unfortunately, the match itself was a drab affair, with the match ending in a disappointing 0-0 stalemate. The USA have progressed in the second round of the World Cup and they will face the European powerhouse, the Netherlands, which might not settle the debate of 'football vs. soccer', but will be an entertaining match, hopefully.

Regardless of what the sport is called, it's important to note that it's the most popular sport in the world that brings people together during mega events like the FIFA World Cup. So, is it called football or soccer? That's for you to decide and then enjoy the action as it unfolds!