Football,or soccer, Game in which two 11-member teams try to propel a ball into the opposing team’s goal, using any part of the body except the hands and arms. Only the goalkeeper, when positioned within the penalty area in front of the goal, may use hands and arms. The game’s first uniform set of rules was put in place in 1863, when England’s Football Association was created. Professional leagues began appearing in the late 1880s, first in England and then in other countries. The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) was founded in 1904, and has hosted the World Cup every four years since 1930. It has been included in the Olympic Games since 1908. Now played on all continents in over 200 countries, with over 250 million players, it is the world’s most popular ball game.

It is the world’s most popular ball game in numbers of participants and spectators. Simple in its principal rules and essential equipment, the sport can be played almost anywhere, from official football playing fields (pitches) to gymnasiums, streets, school playgrounds, parks, or beaches. Football’s governing body, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), estimated that at the turn of the 21st century there were approximately 250 million football players and over 1.3 billion people “interested” in this sports; in 2010 a combined television audience of more than 26 billion watched football’s premier tournament, the quadrennial month-long World Cup finals.

Why Do Some People Call Football “Soccer”?

Know the chemistry involved in making the soccer ball or brazuca used during the 2014 World Cup