People are only just realising why football is called soccer
dailystar.co.ukWho is the greatest footballer of all time? Tell us in the comments section.According to History.com, the word 'soccer' is in actual fact an abbreviation of the word 'association'.British players back in the day shortened the term to 'assoc' and 'assoccer' before the sport eventually adopted the moniker 'soccer' - or the somewhat inconceivable 'soccer football'.And, if you want to get particular nerdy, the addition of the -er suffix was, in fact, often assigned to nicknames within the British dialect and was attributed to Oxford students of that period.Hence why rugby is often referred to as "rugger".The terms soccer and football (or 'soccer football') became interchangeable when describing the sport well into the 20th century, at which point it is said the word football took prominence across most of the globe.However, in countries such as America and Australia, where a different form of football had already been established, the term soccer remained and is still in popular use today.So the next time you find yourself arguing with an American over why they insist on referring to the beautiful game as soccer, just remember: it was actually us Brits who coined the term in the first place!.
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