Februs' Season just looked up

Ooooo. I've hated the Rams for years when they were in LA and the hereditary enemies of my '49ers. Even the move to St. Louis years ago doesn't diminish my loathing of them, especially since they're still in the same division. I despise the Cardinals too and ESPECIALLY the the She-hawks...

I was listening to the Beeb at about lunchtime on the day Mr Moyes was sacked, and was astonished to hear an article about UKIP's immigration policy!

Surely some mistake! I'd have thought that given Auntie's track record of focusing exclusively on only one story ad nauseum someone was bound to be sacked for this lapse into journalism - and it wouldn't be Mr Moyes this time

I think that is rather harsh when they provide such excellent coverage on the Royal Family. Nicholas Whatshisname is particularly good.

Don't worry, smeple - quite a few of us on this side of the ocean don't know either. Nor care.

The term "Soccer" was, in fact, invented by British schoolboys in the 1880's to distinguish the game from its other offshoot which they called "Rugger"

"Rugger" was taken from the first three letters of "Rugby".

The first three letters of "Association" results in the somewhat awkward term "Asser" so they took the third, fourth and fifth letters instead.

The rest is history.

If you really, really want, I shall tell why a soccer referee is called a referee.

I thought Rugby actually got the name because that was the name of the school where it was first played, where legend has it William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it. Aussie Rules football could have very well been called Marngrook, because a fairly recent story has it that the originator of the code got the idea from watching a group of local aborigines playing a game of keepings off with a possum skin and that's what they called it. We do have an indigenous themed football show that's called Marngrook however, though.

Football has been played for many years in England. At times it was an extremely violent game between neighbouring villages. It was even illegal at various times. It has always been the game of the masses, despite the current rules having been put together at Cambridge University.
Rugby is a recent upstart that was a largely public (private) school game.
The public school joke-?sic was that:" Football is a gentlemens' game played by ruffians, Rugby is a ruffians' game played by gentlemen." Soccer was only ever used in England by Public school types.
The usual usage is Football and Rugby.
However it became the game of the masses in Wales and popular in some of the old Empire.
Rugby League is also a very much working class professional variant of Rugby Union that was popular in Lancashire and Yorkshire.

League became the dominant code down here, largely because I think it was professional and the players got paid, whereas payment for playing Union is a fairly recent innovation. This really only applied in NSW and parts of Queensland. The dominant code everywhere else in the country was and still is Australian Rules. Soccer is played in the A-League over the summer (that way it doesn't compete with the rugby and Australian Rules). The rugby's and Aussie Rules do occasionally agitate about soccer taking over from them, but I don't think it will. Part of the problem is that once players show promise they're often lured away by large European and EPL clubs and if they return at all for anything other than national duties it's at the tail end of their careers. Australian Rules has always been fully professional. I think the last 'amateur' player was Don Cordner for Melbourne in the 50's. He was a doctor by profession and refused payment for playing.

The schism that caused Football to break into two different games is worthy of note.

The sole sticking point was over the rule for hacking. Hacking was the practice of running the cleats of your shoes down the shin(s) of an opponent to cause him serious pain. Hacking itself was not the issue, but the great debate was whether you were permitted to hold your opponent, or not, while carrying out the procedure.

The group that became Association Football were adamant that holding was not allowed. and the group that became Rugby Football were equally adamant that it was to be allowed. And in the very first versions of the two games, that was the only noticeable difference. Honest - the earliest Association Football game had all players holding the ball in the course of play, from time to time.

By the time Hacking was outlawed in both games, other sundry rule changes in each had made it impossible to sew them back together again.

Football is "the beautiful game", rugby in comparison always seems an ugly game. Always hated it as a boy but football that is something up there with the best things in life. Things like real coffee, a bowl of steaming hot pasta and spanking of course. Can't wait for the world cup!!