# Non-US team sports **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 19, 2002, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825 "2002-06-19T08:28:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Fern\_Forest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/71c47a/32.png) [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/1 "2002-06-19T08:28:38Z")
Ok, 2 questions. First - How big is Soccer in Canada? They share the NBA, MLB, NHL with the US and they have their own football league, the CFL. So how much do they pay attention to soccer as compared to the US? Judging from certain newsites it seems about the same. Second - In the US we have 6 major team sports (which I see as MLB, NFL, NHL, NBA, college football and college basketball). In Europe and the rest of the world, what do they have besides football(soccer) that draws large crowds, large ratings and world class athletes. I imagine some of them have cricket, rugby and some of the ones big in the US. Like in Japan I know that Baseball is big. What about Germany and France? Korea and China? ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/2 "2002-06-19T09:24:09Z")
Non-US person here. Puzzled query: College football is a different sport from the NFL? College basketball is a different sport from NBA? Are these not just different competitions or tournaments in the same sport? ---
**Author:** ![wolfman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a8b319/32.png) [@wolfman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfman)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/3 "2002-06-19T09:41:25Z")
> [@](#): > > College football is a different sport from the NFL? College basketball is a different sport from NBA? Hmm interesting question, kind of hard to explain. There are some rules differences, but college football and NFL are the same sport. I would guess Osiris was thinking in terms of fan base. Some people are only into the college version, and some people are into the pro sport. There are obviously a lot of people into both, but I think that nearly all fans are into one much more than the other, which, in terms of sports people watch, makes them seperate entities. ---
**Author:** ![Fern\_Forest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/71c47a/32.png) [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/4 "2002-06-19T09:45:07Z")
Well I think of them seperately since both have extremely popular championships in their own right. One group gets paid, one group doesn’t. They have slightly different rules and are organized differently. And they compete against each other for money. Plus each is huge in its own right. Anyhoo that’s the way I see it. Others are certainly free to see it differently. Now minor league baseball and major league baseball I would consider the same since they’re all part of the same system. Players flow freely back and forth between the two. ---
**Author:** ![flodnak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/838e76/32.png) [@flodnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flodnak)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/5 "2002-06-19T09:51:16Z")
For Norway: Summer is football season. Even though Norway has had world-class track and field athletes, nothing in that season touches football for popularity. The rest of the year, skiing dominates. This is actually two sports: Nordic (cross-country and jumping) and Alpine (downhill and the slaloms), and of the two Nordic has the higher prestige, but people go crazy for both of them. Team handball, particularly women’s, is also popular, as is speed skating; a newly started basketball league is showing some promise (even if most of the stars are former second-tier US college athletes and not homegrown talent), and hockey has its devotees as well. But if you want to see a country of sports nuts, just be in Norway when there’s a major cross-country skiing relay going on, and count the number of people who are actually doing productive work. ---
**Author:** ![Tsubaki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@Tsubaki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tsubaki)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/6 "2002-06-19T10:07:20Z")
In Australia: - cricket in the summer - Aussie rules and rugby in the winter\* - netball in the winter - field hockey is popular in different areas. Western Australia has a bit of a following. That’s all I can think of at the moment, but I haven’t lived in Australia for nine years now, so there maybe something I’m missing. As for Japan, there is baseball (HUGE following), soccer, and volleyball. Relay marathons are also hugely popular when they are on. - I know there are two separate rugby codes, but being a West Aussie I don’t know much about rugby at all, which is why I lumped them together. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/7 "2002-06-19T10:13:17Z")
Interesting. Well, leaving aside whether we’re counting sports or competitions, this site [http://www.johann-sandra.com/popularindex.htm](http://www.johann-sandra.com/popularindex.htm) attempts to rank the most popular sports in the world by number of participants. Basketball is number 2 (after volleyball). Soccer is number 4, baseball is number 7, hockey is number 10 (but that’s field hockey, not ice hockey; ice hocky doesn’t appear on the list), rugby is number 12. American football doesn’t feature at all. But that’s participants, not fans. Particpants are easier to measure than fans, so I guess we’ll find more statistics about participants. And this site doesn’t give figures for different countries. According to this cached site in google [http://216.239.35.100/search?q=cache:DgtO9jOpG-QC:www.ontheline.org.uk/explore/journey/france/sport.htm+"most+popular+sports"+France&hl=en&ie=UTF8](http://216.239.35.100/search?q=cache:DgtO9jOpG-QC:www.ontheline.org.uk/explore/journey/france/sport.htm+%22most+popular+sports%22+France&hl=en&ie=UTF8) the most popular sports in France are football (i.e. soccer), rugby, cycling, skiing, tennis, golf and boules. Again, that’s probably participants rather than spectators; nobody watches boules. I can’t find a site for Germany, but I suspect if you take boules off the above list you won’t be far wrong. I’ve no idea what happens in China and Korea, I’m afraid. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/8 "2002-06-19T14:19:41Z")
Well, in Ireland, Gaelic football and hurling were still the leading sports just a generation ago… but while both still exist and are still popular, it appears that the younger generation of Irish has embraced soccer as its favorite sport. The best young athletes in Ireland now seem to be playing soccer, rather than the more traditional Irish games. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/9 "2002-06-19T14:42:04Z")
Well, Irish people who wish to become professional sportsmen have no choice but to play soccer (or, for a few, Australian Rules football), as there are no professional players of Gaelic sports. Lots of amateur players, of course, play in more than one code, or move from one code to another. The principal Gaelic matches would, I think, tend to attract larger crowds that the principal soccer matches, internationals excluded. Soccer’s popularity would be in urban areas, and with the increasing urbanisation of Irish society, soccer’s popularity must have grown. I wouldn’t have thought that it had eclipsed Gaelic games yet, however. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/10 "2002-06-19T14:55:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Osiris \* > I imagine some of them have cricket, [Heck, the US has Cricket!](http://www.usaca.org/) [According to this site,](http://www-ind1.cricket.org/link_to_database/NATIONAL/ICC/MEMBERS/ASSOCIATE_MEMBERS.html) Hong Kong has it. [And according to this page](http://www-ind1.cricket.org/link_to_database/NATIONAL/ICC/MEMBERS/AFFILIATE_MEMBERS.html), both Japan and South Korea have it too! ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/11 "2002-06-19T17:36:38Z")
Australia has Australian Rules (AFL), Rugby Union, Rugby League, Soccer, cricket and a bit of hockey. In the asian countries, table tennis and volleyball dominate but soccer has quite a following as well. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/12 "2002-06-19T18:15:36Z")
There are definitely organized basketball leagues in Australia, Italy and Israel. ---
**Author:** ![Fern\_Forest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/71c47a/32.png) [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2002, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/13 "2002-06-19T23:30:24Z")
Very interesting. But does anybody have any answers for the first question? ---
**Author:** ![KarmaComa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e36b37/32.png) [@KarmaComa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarmaComa)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2002, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/14 "2002-06-20T00:12:52Z")
1. I would guess that European soccer is slightly more popular in Canada than the States, but the Canadian soccer league(s)(?) don’t get the funding or interest to come close to the American league. It seems that there would be more Europeans (particularly Brits) in Canada than in the States (that is, having emigrated in the past, oh, 30 years) but that’s just a blind guess. ---
**Author:** ![Motog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85e7bf/32.png) [@Motog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Motog)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2002, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/15 "2002-06-20T00:18:15Z")
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics the Australian **team** sports with the highest **participation** rates (ie. how many people play it rather than how many watch it) are: Netball - 2.7% of the population Basketball - 2.3% of the population Cricket (outdoor) - 1.9% of the population Australian Rules Football - 1.4% of the population Soccer (outdoor) - 1.4% of the population Touch football - 1.4% of the population Both soccer and cricket have a higher participation rate if you include the indoor variants of the games (an extra 0.8% for cricket and 0.4% for soccer. NB: These are team sports only. All of these are completely eclipsed by individual activities: walking (18.8%), Swimming (13.9%), Aerobics/fitness (10.5%), Tennis (7.4%). These figures are for 1999-2000. I’ll see if I can’t find something on spectator numbers. The team sports that would draw the biggest regular crowds and the big player money in Australia would be (in roughly this order): Australian Rules Football Rugby League Cricket (in summer) Soccer Rugby Union Basketball ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2002, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/16 "2002-06-20T00:23:00Z")
The top Canadian soccer teams play in a league with US teams called the A-League. The A-League would be akin to the First Division of English Football except that it involves two countries. The US teams in the A-League compete with the Major League Soccer teams in the Lamar Hunt Open Cup, which is the US equivalent of the FA Cup. I believe that is the oldest sports trophy in the US. The Los Angeles Galaxy won the Open Cup, but lost in the championship game of the MLS Cup. I don’t know if the Canadian teams have an equivalent competition. ---
**Author:** ![Motog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85e7bf/32.png) [@Motog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Motog)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2002, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/17 "2002-06-20T00:41:38Z")
Found some spectator numbers. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, as a percentage of population, spectator attendance rates (for the 12 months ending April 1999) at various sports were as follows: Australian rules…16.8% Horse racing…11.8% Motor sports…10.6% Rugby league…10.1% Cricket …6.3% Soccer…4.2% Harness racing…3.6% Basketball…3.5% Rugby union…3.0% Tennis…3.0% Dog racing…1.9% Netball…1.7% ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2002, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-us-team-sports/114825/18 "2002-06-20T06:17:54Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by UDS \* > \*\*Soccer’s popularity would be in urban areas, and with the increasing urbanisation of Irish society, soccer’s popularity must have grown. I wouldn’t have thought that it had eclipsed Gaelic games yet, however. \*\* I don’t believe it has. I’d still describe the Gaelic games as the biggest sport(s) here, with soccer closely behind.