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I was born in and live in England.
Listen to people on this thread in the countries where you claiming they call football something else or used too. It has never been the more widely used name, ever. There might be some outliers in programming and magazine with the name soccer (usually more recently to appeal to a global audience), but it has never been widely used, in fact it is more widely used now than it ever has been.

Because they used to. It’s a factual statement. You don’t learn history through osmosis, nor through anecdotal experiences. You have to actually look into it, research it. The term came from Oxford in the 1870s around the same time a founding member of the Football Association, Blackheath Football Club, left the FA and helped as a founding member of the Rugby Football Union, a sport which they still play to this day with that name. It was exported around the world under that name. It was used heavily into the 1970s when it fell out of favor because of the NASL. It’s an accepted academic fact. England created the word, it’s their word. There’s literally zero counter argument here.
 
Because they used to. It’s a factual statement. You don’t learn history through osmosis, nor through anecdotal experiences. You have to actually look into it, research it. The term came from Oxford in the 1870s around the same time a founding member of the Football Association, Blackheath Football Club, left the FA and helped as a founding member of the Rugby Football Union, a sport which they still play to this day with that name. It was exported around the world under that name. It was used heavily into the 1970s when it fell out of favor because of the NASL. It’s an accepted academic fact. England created the word, it’s their word. There’s literally zero counter argument here.


people are literally saying to you we lived in the UK in the 1970s and maybe in other cases earlier and we didnt call it soccer. and you are saying 'yes you did cos this book says you did' and we didnt. People who lived through the history, and yes that is a very accurate way of learning. people saying we didnt call it that and you say 'but this one book I read says you did'.


if you did a survey of the whole population of England born in the sixties I am confident 99% would tell you you were wrong and you would say, no im correct.


 
people are literally saying to you we lived in the UK in the 1970s and maybe in other cases earlier and we didnt call it soccer. and you are saying 'yes you did cos this book says you did' and we didnt. People who lived through the history, and yes that is a very accurate way of learning. people saying we didnt call it that and you say 'but this one book I read says you did'.


if you did a survey of the whole population of England born in the sixties I am confident 99% would tell you you were wrong and you would say, no im correct.



And I’m literally saying to you that you couldn’t be more wrong, your anecdotal experience doesn’t change history or facts.

The word “soccer” was used in English newspapers 123,165 times in the 1950s. In Ireland 22,229 times. In Scotland 7,639 times. In Wales 9,032 times. And that’s excluding any variants for newspaper words that may have split across 2 lines and appeared as something like “soc- cer”.

So let’s focus on that World Cup win. 1966. 16,492 uses of the word “soccer” in the newspapers. World Cup Final on the 30th of July.

Oh what’s this? The Daily Mirror. Page 11. An article on Bobby Charlton and I quote “The two dimensions combine to produce the most alert, adroit and ferocious guided missile machine English Soccer has produced in years.”

Want I find more? Microfilm is fun. It’s almost like I did a history paper on this a few decades ago…
 
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You haven’t seen a game before have you?
Of course I have. I even played in a league when I was a kid... a long, long, time ago. I don't call something boring unless I have experienced the boredom first hand. To me, the game is slightly less exciting than watching paint dry. I don't get the appeal. But, like I said, some people like that sort of thing. Just not me.
 
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Lived through the 70’s to date in England. Never heard anyone refer to the beautiful game as soccer. It’s Football. Always has been, always will be.
You need to get out more. Soccer is a British slang term short for association football used to differentiate it from rugby football. Since Americans adopted and evolved rugby football in to american football and it was more popular, the name was just shortened to football and soccer was the term used for the other game. In England the etymology progressed differently.
 
And I’m literally saying to you that you couldn’t be more wrong, your anecdotal experience doesn’t change history or facts.

The word “soccer” was used in English newspapers 123,165 times in the 1950s. In Ireland 22,229 times. In Scotland 7,639 times. In Wales 9,032 times. And that’s excluding any variants for newspaper words that may have split across 2 lines and appeared as something like “soc- cer”.

So let’s focus on that World Cup win. 1966. 16,492 uses of the word “soccer” in the newspapers. World Cup Final on the 30th of July.

Oh what’s this? The Daily Mirror. Page 11. An article on Bobby Charlton and I quote “The two dimensions combine to produce the most alert, adroit and ferocious guided missile machine English Soccer has produced in years.”

Want I find more? Microfilm is fun. It’s almost like I did a history paper on this a few decades ago…
A minute ago we were in the 1970s and now we are in the 1950s. Unlike the 1970s I wasn’t born then so in between your asserted figures and a quick conversation with my dad who was watching Celtic every week in the 1950s and was confused by my weird question. No according to him he never heard the word soccer.

So taking your figures 7639 mentions in Scotland. According you you of course. That would be 763 mentions a year which is 2 mentions a day across how many papers. The record. Evening times. Scotsman. Herald. A dozen other regional papers. In a football mad country where every paper would have an average of a couple of dozen articles about football.

I’d suggest your stats have proved my point.
 
A minute ago we were in the 1970s and now we are in the 1950s. Unlike the 1970s I wasn’t born then so in between your asserted figures and a quick conversation with my dad who was watching Celtic every week in the 1950s and was confused by my weird question. No according to him he never heard the word soccer.

So taking your figures 7639 mentions in Scotland. According you you of course. That would be 763 mentions a year which is 2 mentions a day across how many papers. The record. Evening times. Scotsman. Herald. A dozen other regional papers. In a football mad country where every paper would have an average of a couple of dozen articles about football.

I’d suggest your stats have proved my point.

The 1970s is the last decade of heavy usage, yes. Would you like me to pull a paper from Scotland? Name any date up to say, 1975. I think you fail to recognize how popular the term was after World War 2… also coinciding with when the US stopped calling it soccer football, combined term, and switched to soccer solely. And my stats show what now? It’s incredibly heavy usage across Britain and Ireland? England the heaviest user of it, also the creator of the term?
 
The 1970s is the last decade of heavy usage, yes. Would you like me to pull a paper from Scotland? Name any date up to say, 1975. I think you fail to recognize how popular the term was after World War 2… also coinciding with when the US stopped calling it soccer football, combined term, and switched to soccer solely. And my stats show what now? It’s incredibly heavy usage across Britain and Ireland? England the heaviest user of it, also the creator of the term?


Your figures don’t show ‘incredibly heavy’ usage as I already said. What what’s scotlands use of the word football over the same period ? What was the usage in the daily record in 1975 ?
 
Your figures don’t show ‘incredibly heavy’ usage as I already said. What what’s scotlands use of the word football over the same period ? What was the usage in the daily record in 1975 ?

1975 - 1,342 across Scottish papers. 13,222 in English. Dying off in the 70s… as previously noted. Correlation: NASL signing Pele, Beckenbauer, Best, etc….
 
And compared to football ?

4,493 for “football” with an explicit exclusion on anything with “rugby” mentioned. Now- this could be unfair, as I’m not able to disseminate between an article that included mention of both sports within it without reading every single one.
 
Can we quit with the argument about how some people are pronouncing f-o-o-t-b-a-l-l as "soccer" (or s-o-c-c-e-r as "football") and talk about something that really matters? How is everyone pronouncing "Celtic?" 🤣
 
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You seem to ignore that football (a.k.a. soccer) is by far the most popular sport all over the world.
I do hope that the feed will be available to all non-US viewers too.
I mean no disrespect to your opinion, though. It is all just a matter of taste and were you grow up.
:)

After having kids in soccer for years and having played many other sports myself I can truly say I am dumbfounded by the talent and insane fitness of those guys. So far beyond just about any other sport I can think of….
 
i dont know... certainly in the uk there's always been a small but decent audience for foreign football as long as it is on regularly. from when everyone watched italian football as they showed it on channel 4, and i know a lot of people who watch spanish football.

also MLS tends to attract players, often past it mind you, who we know the names of and that creates interest. I doubt i would pay a decent amount for the whole live package, but if there was a weekly highlights package i would (as a scotsman who lives in portugal) watch it and would develop interest in the teams. At the minute i'd guess id be a New York Red Bulls fan as they have 3 ex celtic players, but then Vancouver have the advantage of not being American and Ryan Gauld is doing well there....

i think this is a win win situation, good for apple in terms of more content for the basic package which will get some games, and good for the MLS in terms of boosting worldwide exposure.

I’m from England and I seriously don’t imagine many people are going to be watching MLS.
You can literally get whatever football you want form around the world easily enough why would people pick that? Before I moved A league was on over there and I didn’t know anyone besides myself who watched it.
 
And I’m literally saying to you that you couldn’t be more wrong, your anecdotal experience doesn’t change history or facts.

The word “soccer” was used in English newspapers 123,165 times in the 1950s. In Ireland 22,229 times. In Scotland 7,639 times. In Wales 9,032 times. And that’s excluding any variants for newspaper words that may have split across 2 lines and appeared as something like “soc- cer”.

So let’s focus on that World Cup win. 1966. 16,492 uses of the word “soccer” in the newspapers. World Cup Final on the 30th of July.

Oh what’s this? The Daily Mirror. Page 11. An article on Bobby Charlton and I quote “The two dimensions combine to produce the most alert, adroit and ferocious guided missile machine English Soccer has produced in years.”

Want I find more? Microfilm is fun. It’s almost like I did a history paper on this a few decades ago…
You are just being deliberately obnoxious now.
I’m a massive football fan. I come from a footballing hotbed in England. My stepdad has been a football his whole life, his dad before him etc.
None of them ever called it Soccer, and they hate the term, and it is nothing to do with some big name players joining the NASL in the 70’s and 80’s, because actually that was kind of a flop.

Next to my teams stadium there is the largest independent football memorabilia store which sells everything from match programmes, shirts etc from years ago, I mean decades, stuff that predates your claims. There is never a mention of the word Soccer unless the product is from North America.

There is a football museum in Manchester, you can go to it, the word Soccer isn’t used.
Most teams here have stadium tours, museums, and a tour guide. Go to them, the word soccer in these clubs’ history is never used.

When my club was formed, it merged 2 local teams in the late 1900’s, there is a well known story about the different names they were proposing to use, none of them had the word Soccer in them.

When the football league was formed in the 1800’s it was named the Football League, amongst the different proposed names the word Soccer is never used. Same for pretty much every club.

You can see programming from decades ago, even radio broadcasts that predate television, again the word Football is the term that they use. Not even football specific programmes, but show that just make reference to the sport.

The U.K. spread football around the world, not just to Europe, but to South America etc. The stories are well documented. The translation these countries have to call football are translations from the football, not soccer.
You have another forum member on here who grew up in Scotland and now lives on a Portuguese Island which is popular with tourists from around Europe, and he is saying the word has always been football, and people of different nationalities have and always have used the literal translation from the word football.

You can watch documentaries or read about how in the 2nd World War the Nazi’s liked the team Schalke, and the Italian dash it’s liked Lazio, they make 1st hand account from their perspective and the perspective from the allies. Again the word football is used, not soccer.

In the 1st world war there was a well documented Christmas Day truce between the opposing forces. Here they both played football on no man’s land, as well as soldiers cutting the hair of their opposing soldiers and sharing chocolate etc. Diaries and 1st hand records from both sides use the word football.

In the U.K. we have a large group of boomers who desire to have things back to like they were in decades gone by, even stuff that predates their adult lives, like the pre decimalisation of money, and the biggest example of this would be BREXIT. Believe me if Soccer was the preferred term of football in the U.K., then these boomers would be all over returning it to that name. They don’t, in fact they hate it, because it’s more a name that has came up more recently with the popularity of the sport in the North America and how it relates in broadcasts etc from North America.

I’m sorry but you live in the USA, yes you read a book that’s told you one thing, but that book is wrong, listen to the people telling you it is by 1st hand accounts and 2nd hand accounts.
I don’t say and insist on something on something happening or happens in the USA because I read it in a book and dismiss your account.

The term may have originated in the U.K., but as has already been east a listed, this would have been slang, and not a more widely used terminology, and certainly not largely popular or the main terminology.
 
You should stop worrying about what we call it and play better soccer. Embarrassing international window.
Haha, it is a glorified friendly competition at the end of basically a 2 year period where our big name players have had virtually no rest.
By contrast World Champions France are doing just as bad, and European Champions Italy are not doing much better and even failed to qualify for the World Cup, which the USA only qualified for behind Canada.
 
I’m from England and I seriously don’t imagine many people are going to be watching MLS.
You can literally get whatever football you want form around the world easily enough why would people pick that? Before I moved A league was on over there and I didn’t know anyone besides myself who watched it.
I don’t know. Some people watch the A League because it’s usually on early in the morning here. As for the MLS, it may not get many subscribers to the whole game packages, but the games shown by Apple will get a decent audience as the games will be on when the European leagues are out of season, and the games tend to be on late at night.
 
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