http://www.rajtamil.com/upload/Novels/RC%20Novels/Baanumathi.pdf Footballrefers to a number ofsportsthatinvolve, to varying degrees,kickingaballwith t foot to score agoal.

The most popular of these sports worldwide isassociation foo tball, more commonly known as just "football" or "soccer". Unqualified, the wordf ootballapplies to whichever form of football is the most popular in the regional context in which the word appears, including association football, as well asAmer ican football,Australian rules football,Canadian football,Gaelic football,rugby leag ue,rugby union,[1]and other related games. These variations of football are known as football codes. Various forms of football can beidentifiedinhistory, often as popularpeasantgames. Co ntemporary codes of football can be traced back tothe codification of these games at English public schoolsin the eighteenth and nineteenth century.[2][3]The influ ence and power of theBritish Empireallowed these rules of football to spread to ar eas of British influence outside of the directly controlled Empire,[4]though by t he end of the nineteenth century, distinct regional codes were already developin g: Gaelic Football, forexample, deliberately incorporated the rules of local trad itional football games in order to maintain theirheritage.[5]In 1888,The Football L eaguewasfoundedin England, becoming the first of manyprofessionalfootball competitio ns. During the twentieth century, the various codes of football became amongst t he most popular team sports in the world.[6] Contents [hide] * 1Common elements * 2Etymology * 3Early history o 3.1Ancient games o 3.2Medieval and early modern Europe o 3.3Calcio Fiorentino o 3.4Official disapproval and attempts to ban football * 4Establishment of modern codes o 4.1English public schools o 4.2Firsts o 4.3Cambridge rules o 4.4Sheffield rules o 4.5Australian rules o 4.6Football Association o 4.7Rugby football o 4.8North American football codes o 4.9Gaelic football o 4.10Schism in Rugby football o 4.11Globalisation of association football o 4.12Further divergence of the two rugby codes * 5Use of the word "football" * 6Football codes board * 7Present day codes and families o 7.1Association football and descendants o 7.2Rugby school football and descendants o 7.3Irish and Australian varieties o 7.4Surviving medieval ball games o 7.5Surviving UK school games o 7.6Recent inventions and hybrid games o 7.7Tabletop games and other recreations * 8See also * 9Notes * 10References