The Name Game

Phill Chadwick believes its time for everybody to lay down their arms over the 'football or soccer' debate and use some common sense.

There has been a lot of sometimes acrimonious discussion recently both in print and on talkback radio about the growing use of the word "Football" to describe the World Game.

This seems to be particularly intense in the AFL-dominated states of Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia.

Let me put one thing absolutely straight. The sports of Association Football, Australian Rules Football, Rugby League Football, Rugby Union Football, Gaelic Football, American Football and all their variants are all perfectly entitled to call their game Football. No-one can take that away.

However, for convenience, they all have what you might call a nickname, or shorthand form of their name.

Association Football has been known since its inception as "soccer".

Australian Rules Football is generally called in the southern states "footy". In other areas it is usually called "AFL".

Rugby League Football is known as "league".

Rugby Union Football is commonly referred to just as "rugby".

And so on.

These are convenient labels that allow anyone interested in the sports to easily distinguish between them. Imagine the confusion if all of them insisted on being called "Football".

Obviously:
"Are you going to the rugby today, Harry?"

"No, mate, I already have tickets to the soccer, so I am going there instead."

Is far clearer than:
"Are you going to the Football today, Harry?"

"No, mate, I already have tickets to the Football, so I am going there instead."

So, naturally, we all use their nicknames, as convenient labels to get our message across with the minimum of confusion.

This is where the pro-AFL-anti-soccer people get it wrong. They do not own the name "Football" any more than anyone else. And they should realise that the Football Federation of Australia is not trying to steal it away from them. They need to realise that the whole point of using the word Football instead of Soccer is just to let everyone know that the World Game will no longer be content to be a second class citizen.

The old NSL, the National Soccer League, was the first Australian national club competition in any sport, but it was content to have its official name be "Soccer". That, to me, showed an inferiority complex. The officials did not believe that the public would accept it as a Football competition.

Most clubs were called something like "Oonawoopwoop S.C." Again, that shows how intimidated they were by the other codes.

Times have changed. Today, we have Sydney F.C. competing in the Club World Championship. We have the Football Federation of Australia running the game. We have Adelaide United F.C. top of the A-League. All unselfconsciously using the term "Football" in its rightful place.

A-League coaches refer to the need to play "good football", without having to use the "S"-word. Nobody thinks Kosmina or Littbarski are referring to Australian Rules, or Rugby League, do they?

So my plea is that the supporters of the other codes stop being so precious about the word Football. We are not trying to stop you using it, so why try to stop us? Let's all agree that the various codes are all legitimate forms of Football, and use the term appropriately.

Let's also all agree that each code has its own informal name, and use that when appropriate, to avoid confusion.

When I am talking to my workmates, born and bred on SANFL and AFL football, it would be silly to start talking about football, only for them to eventually figure out that it is Adelaide United, not Adelaide Crows that I am on about. For clarity and for the sake of clear communication, naturally I rave about the great soccer match I saw on the weekend.

So everybody get off this pointless debate. "Football" is the official name of the sport, "soccer" is the informal name. End of story.

And when we eventually mature enough, "Socceroos" will cease to be the official name of our national team, and move to what it should be, a much-loved nickname.

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