Association football, more commonly known as simply football or soccer, is a team sport played with a spherical ball between two teams of 11 players. It is played by approximately 250 million players in over 200 countries and dependencies, making it the world's most popular sport. The game is played on a rectangular field called a pitch with a goal at each end. The object of the game is to score more goals than the opposition by moving the ball beyond the goal line into the opposing goal, usually within a time frame of 90 or more minutes.
A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby league and rugby union.
FIFA is a non-profit organization that describes itself as an international governing body of association football, futsal and beach soccer. It is the highest governing body of association football.
The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The championship has been awarded every four years since the inaugural tournament in 1930, except in 1942 and 1946 when it was not held because of the Second World War. The current champion is France, which won its second title at the 2018 tournament in Russia.
Juventus Football Club, colloquially known as Juventus and Juve, is a professional football club based in Turin, Piedmont, Italy, that competes in the Serie A, the top tier of the Italian football league system. Founded in 1897 by a group of Torinese students, the club has worn a black and white striped home kit since 1903 and has played home matches in different grounds around its city, the latest being the 41,507-capacity Juventus Stadium. Nicknamed Vecchia Signora, the club has won 36 official league titles, 14 Coppa Italia titles and nine Supercoppa Italiana titles, being the record holder for all these competitions; two Intercontinental Cups, two European Cups / UEFA Champions Leagues, one European Cup Winners' Cup, a joint national record of three UEFA Cups, two UEFA Super Cups and a joint national record of one UEFA Intertoto Cup. Consequently, the side leads the historical Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio (FIGC) classify whilst on the international stage occupies the sixth position in Europe and the twelfth in the world for most confederation titles won with eleven trophies, as well as the fourth in the all-time Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) competitions ranking, having obtained the highest coefficient score during seven seasons since its introduction in 1979, the most for an Italian team in both cases and joint second overall in the last cited.
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league consisting of 32 teams, divided equally between the National Football Conference (NFC) and the American Football Conference (AFC). The NFL is one of the four major North American professional sports leagues and the highest professional level of American football in the world. Its eighteen-week regular season runs from early September to early January, with each team playing seventeen games and having one bye week. Following the conclusion of the regular season, seven teams from each conference advance to the playoffs, a single-elimination tournament culminating in the Super Bowl, which is usually held on the first Sunday in February and is played between the champions of the NFC and AFC. The league is headquartered in New York City.
The UEFA Champions League is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competition winners through a round robin group stage to qualify for a double-legged knockout format, and a single leg final. It is one of the most prestigious football tournaments in the world and the most prestigious club competition in European football, played by the national league champions of their national associations.
Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, commonly referred to as Tottenham or Spurs, is an English professional football club based in Tottenham, London, that competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English football. The team has played its home matches in the 62,850-capacity Tottenham Hotspur Stadium since April 2019, replacing their former home of White Hart Lane, which had been demolished to make way for the new stadium on the same site.
The Ballon d'Or is an annual football award presented by French news magazine France Football that is one of the oldest and generally regarded as the most prestigious individual award for football players. It has been awarded since 1956, although between 2010 and 2015, an agreement was made with FIFA, and the award was temporarily merged with the FIFA World Player of the Year and known as the FIFA Ballon d'Or. However, the partnership ended in 2016, and the award reverted to the Ballon d'Or, while FIFA also reverted to its own separate annual award The Best FIFA Men's Player. The recipients of the joint FIFA Ballon d'Or are considered as winners by both award organisations.
The English Football League Championship is the highest division of the English Football League (EFL) and second-highest overall in the English football league system after the Premier League. The league is contested by 24 clubs. Each season, the two top-finishing teams in the Championship are automatically promoted to the Premier League. The teams that finish the season in 3rd to 6th place enter a playoff tournament, with the winner also gaining promotion to the Premier League. The three lowest-finishing teams in the Championship are relegated to League One.
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish football team is the intercollegiate football team representing the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Indiana, north of the city of South Bend. The team plays its home games at the campus's Notre Dame Stadium, which has a capacity of 77,622. Notre Dame is one of seven schools that competes as an Independent at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) level; however, they play five games a year against opponents from the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), of which Notre Dame is a member in all other sports except ice hockey. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Notre Dame football competed as an ACC member for the 2020 FBS season. During the 2020 season, they went on to appear in the ACC Championship Game.
The FIFA Club World Cup is an international men's association football competition organised by the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The competition was first contested in 2000 as the FIFA Club World Championship. It was not held from 2001 to 2004 due to a combination of factors, most importantly the collapse of FIFA's marketing partner International Sport and Leisure (ISL), but since 2005 it has been held every year, and has been hosted by Brazil, Japan, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco and Qatar. Views differ as to the cup's prestige: it struggles to attract interest in most of Europe, and is the object of heated debate in South America.
The USC Trojans football program represents University of Southern California in the sport of American football. The Trojans compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the South Division of the Pac-12 Conference (Pac-12).
The Michigan Wolverines football team represents the University of Michigan in college football at the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision level. Michigan has the most all-time wins in college football history. The team is known for its distinctive winged helmet, its fight song, its record-breaking attendance figures at Michigan Stadium, and its many rivalries, particularly its annual, regular season-ending game against Ohio State, known simply as “The Game,” once voted as ESPN's best sports rivalry.
The 2018 FIFA World Cup was an international football tournament contested by men's national teams that took place between 14 June and 15 July 2018 in Russia. It was the 21st FIFA World Cup, a worldwide football tournament held once every four years. It was the eleventh time the championships had been held in Europe, and the first time they were held in Eastern Europe. At an estimated cost of over $14.2 billion, it was the most expensive World Cup to date.
A national championship in the highest level of college football in the United States, currently the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), is a designation awarded annually by various organizations to their selection of the best college football team. Division I FBS football is the only National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) sport for which the NCAA does not sanction a yearly championship event. As such, it is sometimes unofficially referred to as a "mythical national championship".
American football, referred to simply as football in the United States also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with possession of the oval-shaped football, attempts to advance down the field by running with the ball or passing it, while the defense, the team without possession of the ball, aims to stop the offense's advance and to take control of the ball for themselves. The offense must advance at least ten yards in four downs or plays; if they fail, they turn over the football to the defense, but if they succeed, they are given a new set of four downs to continue the drive. Points are scored primarily by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone for a touchdown or kicking the ball through the opponent's goalposts for a field goal. The team with the most points at the end of a game wins.
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word football normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly called football include association football ; gridiron football ; Australian rules football; rugby union and rugby league; and Gaelic football. These various forms of football share to varying extent common origins and are known as football codes.
The 2020 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2020 or simply Euro 2020, was the 16th UEFA European Championship, the quadrennial international men's football championship of Europe organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA). To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the European Championship competition, UEFA president Michel Platini declared that the tournament would be hosted in several nations as a "romantic" one-off event, with 11 cities in 11 UEFA countries each providing venues for the tournament. Defending champions Portugal, who won UEFA Euro 2016 in France, were eliminated in the round of 16 by Belgium. Italy won their second European Championship title by beating England on penalties in the final following a 1–1 draw after extra time. The win came exactly on the 39th anniversary of Italy's 1982 FIFA World Cup Final win over West Germany.
The College Football Playoff (CFP) is an annual postseason knockout invitational tournament to determine a national champion for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest level of college football competition in the United States. Four teams play in two semifinal games, and the winner of each semifinal advances to the College Football Playoff National Championship game.
