Portal:Association football

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Association football, commonly known as football, or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players each, who primarily use their feet to propel a ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is to score more goals than the opposing team by moving the ball beyond the goal line into a rectangular-framed goal defended by the opposing team. Traditionally, the game has been played over two 45-minute halves, for a total match time of 90 minutes. With an estimated 250 million players active in over 200 countries and territories, it is the world's most popular sport.

The game of association football is played in accordance with the Laws of the Game, a set of rules that has been in effect since 1863 and maintained by the IFAB since 1886. The game is played with a football that is 68–70 cm (27–28 in) in circumference. The two teams compete to get the ball into the other team's goal (between the posts, under the bar, and across the goal line), thereby scoring a goal. When the ball is in play, the players mainly use their feet, but may use any other part of their body, except for their hands or arms, to control, strike, or pass the ball. Only the goalkeepers may use their hands and arms, and only then within the penalty area. The team that has scored more goals at the end of the game is the winner. There are situations where a goal can be disallowed, such as an offside call or a foul in the build-up to the goal. Depending on the format of the competition, an equal number of goals scored may result in a draw being declared, or the game goes into extra time or a penalty shoot-out.

Internationally, association football is governed by FIFA. Under FIFA, there are six continental confederations: AFC, CAF, CONCACAF, CONMEBOL, OFC, and UEFA. Of these confederations, CONMEBOL is the oldest one, being founded in 1916. National associations (e.g. The FA or JFA) are responsible for managing the game in their own countries both professionally and at an amateur level, and coordinating competitions in accordance with the Laws of the Game. The most senior and prestigious international competitions are the FIFA World Cup and the FIFA Women's World Cup. The men's World Cup is the most-viewed sporting event in the world, surpassing the Olympic Games. The two most prestigious competitions in European club football are the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA Women's Champions League, which attract an extensive television audience throughout the world. Since 2009, the final of the men's tournament has been the most-watched annual sporting event in the world. (Full article...)

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Panoramic image of Brøndby stadium taken in 2006

Brøndby IF is a Danish professional football club based in the town of Brøndby, on the western outskirts of Copenhagen. The club, founded in 1964 as a merger between two local Brøndby clubs, has won 10 national Danish football championship titles and five national Danish Cups, since the club joined the Danish top-flight football league in 1981. Brøndby is the most successful Danish club in European competitions, with their appearance in a UEFA Cup semi-final being the best ever Danish result. Furthermore the club was the first Danish club to qualify for the UEFA Champions League, during the 1998-99 tournament.

Since the founding of fellow Copenhagen club F.C. Copenhagen in 1992, the two clubs have had a fierce rivalry, and the so-called "New Firm" games between the two sides attract the biggest crowds in Danish football. With F.C. Copenhagen, Brøndby has consistently formed a duo which have won eleven of the last sixteen Danish Superliga championships, and from 1995 to 2006, the club did not finish below second spot in the league. (Full article...)

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Frank Barson (10 April 1891 – 13 September 1968) was an English footballer born in Grimesthorpe. He started life as a blacksmith, and began his football career with Sheffield amateur clubs Albion FC and Cammell Laird's before joining Barnsley in 1911. He went on to play for a number of clubs in English football including Manchester United and Aston Villa, with whom he won the FA Cup in 1920.

Barson was known as one of the most feared players of his era, and had a reputation as a "hard man" of English football. On frequent occasions Barson was escorted out of grounds by policemen to protect him from mobs of angry opposition fans and he was once banned from the game for seven months for a challenge in a match against Fulham.

He played up until the age of 39, eventually signing on as an amateur with Wigan Borough and his last ever appearance as a player was in a game against Accrington Stanley on Boxing Day 1930 in which he was sent off in the 83rd minute. (Full article...)

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The Argentine Football Association (Spanish: Asociación del Fútbol Argentino, locally [asosjaˈsjon del ˈfuðβol aɾxenˈtino]; AFA) is the governing body of football in Argentina based in Buenos Aires. It organises the main divisions of Argentine league system (from Primera División to Torneo Regional Federal and Torneo Promocional Amateur), including domestic cups: Copa Argentina, Supercopa Argentina, Copa de la Liga Profesional, Trofeo de Campeones de la Liga Profesional and the Supercopa Internacional. The body also manages all the Argentina national teams, including the Senior, U-20, U-17, U-15, Olympic and women's squads. Secondly, it also organizes the women's, children, youth, futsal, and other local leagues.

The AFA also organised all the Primera División championships from 1893 to 2016–17. From the 2017–18 season the "Superliga Argentina", an entity which was administered independently and had its own statute, took over the Primera División championships. Nevertheless, the Superliga was contractually linked with the main football body. The last championship organised by the Superliga was 2019–20, shortly after the season ended the body was dissolved. (Full article...)

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... that Carlton Town F.C., now competing at the eighth tier of the English football pyramid, was once denied promotion by a hat-trick scored by future England international Jamie Vardy?
... that goalkeeper Sophie Whitehouse, who has lived in England, Africa and the US, has been chosen to play soccer for the Republic of Ireland?
... that Ryan Roberts, a defensive end for Notre Dame, was a soccer player in high school?
... that after his soccer career, Steve Palacios enlisted in the United States Army and played for the United States Armed Forces soccer team?
... that Ecuadorian footballer Hernán Galíndez won a bicycle for beating a team featuring Lionel Messi when they were children?
... that Welsh footballer Jon Morgan went on to become a college principal after retiring?

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Street football

Credit: Flickr user Dipanker Dutta

A game of Street football in Kolkata, West Bengal, India. The term street football encompasses a wide variety of informal games that are loosely based on association football but do not necessarily enforce all, or indeed any, of the Laws of the Game. Often the most basic of set-ups will involve just a ball with a wall or fence used as a goal, or items such as clothing being used for goalposts. The ease of playing these informal games means that they are popular all over the world.

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Before the match my daughter said: 'Beenie the horse wants to sit next to you by the drinks holder on the touchline'. It is difficult to tell a seven-year-old: 'This is the Premiership, I’m known as Psycho and I'm a hard man'.

— Stuart Pearce, on having a cuddly toy with him on the bench

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The following are images from various association football-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Japanese high-school girls playing football in their traditional hakama with one team wearing sashes (c. 1920) (from Women's association football)
Image 2FC de Rakt DA1 (2008/2009) (from Women's association football)
Image 3Sheffield F.C. (here pictured in 1876) is the oldest association club still active, having been founded in 1857 (from History of association football)
Image 4From 1866 to 1883, the laws provided for a tape between the goalposts (from Laws of the Game (association football))
Image 5Marta wearing the Brazil number 10 during a match in the 2007 Pan American Games (from Women's association football)
Image 6Old Etonians v Blackburn Rovers match. Illustration by S.T. Dadd, 1882 (from History of association football)
Image 7Harrow School team of 1867. (from History of association football)
Image 8Drawing of the first international game by artist William Ralston (from History of association football)
Image 9Chelsea, a women's football club of London, England in 2020. (from Women's association football)
Image 10Mia Hamm (left) battles with German defender Kerstin Stegemann (from Women's association football)
Image 11Yuki Ogimi (17) scores for Japan against the United States off a pass from Homare Sawa (10) as Kelley O'Hara (5) defends and Hope Solo (1) attempts to save. (from Women's association football)
Image 12The Royal Engineers team who reached the first FA Cup final in 1872 (from History of association football)
Image 13Abby Wambach and England captain Steph Houghton shake hands before kick off on February 13, 2015 (from Women's association football)
Image 14When first introduced in 1891, the penalty was awarded for offences within 12 yards of the goal-line. (from Laws of the Game (association football))
Image 15"North" team of the British Ladies' Football Club, 1895 (from Women's association football)
Image 16An early draft of the original hand-written 'Laws of the Game' drawn up on behalf of The Football Association by Ebenezer Cobb Morley in 1863 on display at the National Football Museum, Manchester. (from Laws of the Game (association football))
Image 17Iran vs Turkey in 2010 Youth Olympics (from Women's association football)
Image 18A Welsh women's football team pose for a photograph in 1959 (from Women's association football)
Image 19Representation of a football match from the book Athletics and football, 1894 (from History of association football)

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The 2010 FIFA World Cup was the 19th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national football teams. It took place in South Africa from 11 June to 11 July 2010. The bidding process for hosting the tournament finals was open only to African nations. In 2004, the international football federation, FIFA, selected South Africa over Egypt and Morocco to become the first African nation to host the finals.

The matches were played in 10 stadiums in nine host cities around the country, with the opening and final played at the Soccer City stadium in South Africa's largest city, Johannesburg. Thirty-two teams were selected for participation via a worldwide qualification tournament that began in August 2007. In the first round of the tournament finals, the teams competed in round-robin groups of four teams for points, with the top two teams in each group proceeding. These 16 teams advanced to the knockout stage, where three rounds of play decided which teams would participate in the final. (Full article...)

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... that MLS Cup 1999 was played with new rule changes that were approved days before the game? (28 March 2021)
... that both Robbie Williams and Michael Jackson played for Blackpool in the 2007 Football League One play-off Final? (24 March 2021)
... that Irish sportswoman Carol Breen has played internationally in both association and Australian rules football? (17 March 2021)
... that, during his time in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp, footballer Ernie Curtis would obtain extra food by teaching his captors how to play with a ball made of paper? (27 March 2021)
... that the 2010 Football League Two play-off Final at Wembley Stadium was won by "a pub team from Essex"? (25 February 2021)
... that a team including bricklayers, assistant bank managers and insurance clerks defeated Coventry City in the third round of the FA Cup in 1989? (5 April 2021)