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The History of the Soccer Ball
Soccer has been played in various forms though out history. Many sites on the world wide web have information on the history of football or soccer. in japan 1004 B.C. was earliest form of soccer , players kicked a ball around small field and traced as far back. In German museum in Munich is text from approximately 50 B.C. that mentions games very similar to soccer that were played between teams from Japan and China. The Chinese kicked leather ball and it is known with certainty that a soccer game was played in 611 A.D. in the then Japanese capital, Kyoto.
The Romans played a game that somewhat resembled modern soccer. The early Olympic games in Rome featured twenty-seven men on a side who completed so vigorously that two-thirds of them had to be hospitalized after a fifty-minute game.
The contemporary history of the world's favourite game spans more than 100 years. It all began in 1863 in England, when rugby football and association football branched off on their different courses and the Football Association in England was formed - becoming the sport's first governing body.
Both codes stemmed from a common root and both have a long and intricately branched ancestral tree. A search down the centuries reveals at least half a dozen different games, varying to different degrees, and to which the historical development of football has been traced back. Whether this can be justified in some instances is disputable. Nevertheless, the fact remains that people have enjoyed kicking a ball about for thousands of years and there is absolutely no reason to consider it an aberration of the more 'natural' form of playing a ball with the hands.
On the contrary, apart from the need to employ the legs and feet in tough tussles for the ball, often without any laws for protection, it was recognised right at the outset that the art of controlling the ball with the feet was not easy and, as such, required no small measure of skill. The very earliest form of the game for which there is scientific evidence was an exercise from a military manual dating back to the second and third centuries BC in China.
This Han Dynasty forebear of football was called Tsu' Chu and it consisted of kicking a leather ball filled with feathers and hair through an opening, measuring only 30-40cm in width, into a small net fixed onto long bamboo canes. According to one variation of this exercise, the player was not permitted to aim at his target unimpeded, but had to use his feet, chest, back and shoulders while trying to withstand the attacks of his opponents. Use of the hands was not permitted.
Another form of the game, also originating from the Far East, was the Japanese Kemari, which began some 500-600 years later and is still played today. This is a sport lacking the competitive element of Tsu' Chu with no struggle for possession involved. Standing in a circle, the players had to pass the ball to each other, in a relatively small space, trying not to let it touch the ground.
The Greek 'Episkyros' - of which few concrete details survive - was much livelier, as was the Roman 'Harpastum'. The latter was played out with a smaller ball by two teams on a rectangular field marked by boundary lines and a centre line. The objective was to get the ball over the opposition's boundary lines and as players passed it between themselves, trickery was the order of the day. The game remained popular for 700-800 years, but, although the Romans took it to Britain with them, the use of feet was so small as to scarcely be of consequence.
At 1st, it was England where soccer was originally banned, that eventually exported modern soccer to every continent in the world. today, undisputedly soccer is the most watched and played sport in the world enjoyed by 8 million people. This past World cup, that took place in the united States was watched by an estimated 33 million people around the world for almost 27 days. This makes soccer, the most watched single sports event in the world not surpassed even by the Olympics. This sport is bigger than baseball, football and basketball combined
One of the two soccer balls used in the first 1930 World Cup final between Argentina and Uruguay is shown above. This leather football was used in the final match and taken by an Uruguayan team player. It may have even played a part in the outcome of the first world cup in 1930. Argentina and Uruguay could not agree on which ball to use. So they decided to use an Argentinean ball the first half and a ball supplied by Uruguay the second half. As it turned out, Argentina was ahead at halftime 2-1. However; Uruguay came back to win the match in the second half 4-2 using their ball
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Originally Posted by gio1@
Duffee loss his match
