The game is known as ’soccer’ only in North America, while the rest of the world recognizes it as ‘football’. In America, the game of ‘Grid Iron’ is actually known as ‘football’, hence the disparity between the worldwide football definitions. Actually the name soccer is a corrupt form of the original term ‘association of football’, abbreviated as ‘assoc’ and is the most recognized sport in the world today. 
Played in almost every country and unequivocally loved, soccer is rather worshiped like a religion, with its players being Gods! There is a possibility for us being unaware of a number of things about soccer. Here are some interesting and some funny facts about the fascinating game of soccer.
The Romans played a game named ‘harpastum’ which can be said to be the origin of soccer game of the modern era. In the early days of the game, the referees used to wave a handkerchief to control the players. The whistles were introduced in the game in the year 1878. Undoubtedly, the sport is most popular in Europe and South America, but its origins could be found in China, more than 2000 years ago. In 14th century England, the game was banned for being too violent, but ironically, the first ever soccer match was played in Derby, in England itself. Soccer became an Olympic sport in the year 1908. There are 13 major soccer league teams today and more than 7 million children play soccer in the United States of America itself.
The outfield of soccer is 100 to 130 yards long and 50 to 100 yards wide. A single soccer player runs about 7 miles during an entire game. The soccer ball is measured to be around 28 inches in its circumference, and I bet, you didn’t know that more than 80% of the world’s soccer balls are produced in Pakistan. The World Cup, held in a different country after every 4 years, is the biggest and the most desired event amongst the game’s fans.
The first ever soccer World Cup was held in the year 1930, which was won by the host country, Uruguay. The number of spectators was 300. Mexico is the only country to host the soccer World Cup event twice. Brazil has won 5 World Cups whereas Argentina has won 2. An interesting fact is that European countries have always been in the World Cup finals, except for the years 1930 and 1950.
