Introduction
Football is an extremely popular game that attracts fans worldwide. Football helps in stress relief, discipline, teamwork and fitness to the players and fans. Much wonder how, when and where it all started to be called football.
Evolution and the Beginnings of Standardization
Football history dates back to ancient Greek game called harpaston, which meant a rough and brutal game. Harpaston was quite a classic game played by two teams against each other. One scored by running past the goal line with the ball or kicking the ball past the goal line. The rules and objectives were straightforward: score and prevented the opponent from scoring. However, the game had no limits to the size of the field, number of players or side boundaries. This was in the twelfth century that marked the origin of football.
Football first became popular in England. Rules were effected when it became a leading sport in public schools, in the 1800s. Different versions of football were created according to interpretation of the rules. The rugby school developed the game differently by running with the ball, had foot goal posts with a ten feet cross bar. This called for a unique rule that one had to score by kicking the ball over the bar and between the posts. This lead to ‘off-your side’ rule where one was not to pass the ball forward. Today, offside rule is when one is in front of all the opponents’ players. In the 1860s, Britain took up rugby in schools and universities and named it the