# Origin of Association football **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [March 1, 2010, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-association-football/530844 "2010-03-01T10:05:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2010, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-association-football/530844/1 "2010-03-01T10:05:50Z")
Here’s a [page](http://www.sportingo.com/all-sports/a11587_worlds-top-most-popular-team-sports) that claims: > [@](#): > > [Soccer’s] origin is Chinese, where it was discovered by the English And I’m going “Huh? That’s news to me!” Is this true? I thought I read somewhere that football was played in England in various forms long before there was any significant interaction between England and China. The Wikipedia article on Association football doesn’t really discuss the origin, but just the standardization of the rules in the mid-19th century. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2010, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-association-football/530844/2 "2010-03-03T04:08:47Z")
bump ---
**Author:** ![PopeJewish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@PopeJewish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PopeJewish)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2010, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-association-football/530844/3 "2010-03-03T06:13:40Z")
Basically that’s bullshit. The chinese had a game similar to soccer, the Greeks/Romans had one, even the south americans had Tlachi or whatever it’s called (which itself varied greatly from culture to culture), basically everyone had a game that was somewhat similar to soccer. A quick google search comes up with several sites that all say no one really knows where soccer started, it all kinda evolved from a variety of different games that have been played for millennia ---
**Author:** ![Ian\_D.Bergkamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Ian\_D.Bergkamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ian_D.Bergkamp)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2010, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-association-football/530844/4 "2010-03-03T15:08:46Z")
For what it’s worth (probably very little), [FIFA](http://tdifh.blogspot.com/2009/07/15-july-2004-fifas-stock-in-england.html) has recognized China as the birthplace of association football. > [@](#): > > FIFA President Sepp Blatter, speaking at the opening ceremony for the Third International Football Expo in Beijing, announced that the organization agreed with the findings of the Chinese Football Association who dated the origins of the game back to approximately 300 B.C. in the city of Linzi in the Shandong Province. While it may well be true that the Chinese invented a sport similar to today’s football, there doesn’t seem to be any transference link between that sport and what was subsequently popularized by the English, so I still give the English credit for creating the modern game. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2010, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-association-football/530844/5 "2010-03-03T15:41:19Z")
> [@I'm Not Dennis Bergkamp](#): > > While it may well be true that the Chinese invented a sport similar to today’s football, there doesn’t seem to be any transference link between that sport and what was subsequently popularized by the English, so I still give the English credit for creating the modern game. This. In any case, I suspect boys have been kicking around balls of rags in every culture for thousands of years.