‘Soccer’ is not an Americanism; It’s a very English word

There’s a lot of snobbery – particularly in England – around the use of the word ‘soccer’. But I want to put the record straight, because ‘soccer’ is not – as often believed – an Americanism. In fact, the word was invented by an Englishman and is very useful in countries where Association rules football is not the predominant code.

In the late nineteenth century, what we now know as ‘football’ was by no means the dominant footballing code and had only recently been introduced to many countries. In the early 1870s, there was even a chance that the Rugby rules code could have won the code supremacy in Britain, until the creation of the FA Cup tipped the balance.

In Australia, there was the Victorian rules (now Australian rules), in North America, the collegiate game (now American football), and in Ireland ‘football’ often meant the Gaelic rules. And, of course, there was rugby.

As the two English footballing codes of Association and Rugby rules vied for supremacy in Britain and beyond, it was often the upper and middle classes that were playing sports. Blackburn Olympic would become the first ‘working class’ team to win the FA Cup in 1883, signifying an irreversible shift towards working class dominance of Association football.

Just two years later, Association football went professional, leaving rugby behind and leading to the ‘gentleman amateur’ sides to continue the spirit of playing for the love of playing.

Meet Charles Wreford-Brown, inventor of the word ‘soccer’

One of the gentleman amateur sides, Corinthians, toured the world to strengthen nascent football cultures. One of their key stars, Charles Wreford-Brown, captained the England national side and also played county cricket for Gloucestershire.

After hanging up his boots, he still continued in football, running the line in the controversial Olympic football final of 1920 in Antwerp, where the Czechoslovakian team walked off in disgust at the officials, forfeiting their silver medal. He was also vice-president of the Football Association for the last ten years of his life.

Wreford-Brown is credited with coming up with the word ‘soccer’. The word ‘rugger’ was coined as a familiar word for the Rugby rules, so Wreford-Brown is reputed to have shortened the word ‘Association’ to ‘Soccer’.

By the mid 1890s, we see newspaper reports in England including the word ‘soccer’ for football to help differentiate it from other football codes, so it was obviously part of the English lexicon by then.

As someone who’s played football in Australia in the Victorian Soccer Federation, I actually found it easier to call the sport soccer than get into a debate about ‘football’ – because ‘football’ in the State of Victoria means Aussie Rules, while ‘football’ in New South Wales is rugby league, and ‘football’ in New Zealand is rugby union.

Outside of Britain, ‘soccer’ is just a great way to show you’re talking about the round ball game rather than any other code. And no, it’s not an Americanism.

If you’re interested in the roots of football around the world, then be sure to get a copy of my book Origin Stories: The Pioneers Who Took Football to the World. It’s the country-by-country story of how football spread around the globe in rough chronological order.