Why do the English claim they invented football, when it was in actual fact, the chinese?

Question

History states that the chinese found the idea of kicking a round shape into the back of a net. Although, of course the game wasn't refined with all the offside rules and stuff, but they invented the concept of the game

Answer 1

the english think they own everything... tats y... don't let that get to u...

Answer 2

The English are claiming credit for a lot of things, and when one looks at the facts and details more closely, those claims often disappear into thin air. So I would in general take any English claims with a pinch of salt.

Football-like games (or early versions of football) were played in a number of civilisations. The ancient Celts in Western Europe invented and played a lot of team sports (to keep their warriors occupied in peacetime), and one of their games was kicking a skull (and later an air-filled pig's bladder) around with two teams trying to put it into a certain field or area.
Once a year whole villages played such games, and in some parts of the English West Country this tradition has survived and is still practised today.
There were similar kinds of games played by the Incas, Mayas and Aztecs, and by the Mongols as well. I had not heard about China before, but it does not surprise me, since the Chinese had a far superior civilisation with advanced culture at a time when the West was still a widely uncivilised area inhabited by wild and illiterate Barbarians.

Modern Football (or Soccer, as some call it as well) developed from these ancient games. And its modern structure, with all the rules and regulations about the field, the teams, the ball and the matches was indeed developed and structured in 19th century England. There was a parallel development in Germany, but since there was no single German state at the time, the impact was much less effective. England, on the other hand, being the heartland of the British Empire, spread their version of Football around the globe, and this is until today the accepted version of the world's most popular sport.

Answer 3

That is rubbish, while it may be true that a similar game was played, it wasn't the same, and England and China has almost no communication then.

Football originated from age old games of mob football in England, and it was refined over the years. I think it was only a couple of hundred years ago they stopped using their hands and used only their feet. The games it originated from are far older, English, and have completely different roots to the game that was played in China.

Anyway, a game even older but very similar was played in south America. But before America was discovered by Europeans. By that time football had already been invented. We cannot claim that that game is the origin of football, and so it is perfectly feasible to say the Chinese game cuju isn't either.

Answer 4

dumbass! chinese didnt invent it. All over the world there is evidence of most civilisations playing some kind of game involving kicking an object.
The British (not just the English) were the 1st ones to formalise the game and give it a set area and set rules.
you see different schools and Universities had different rules so a group of Univeristy students (These Gentleman were from all corners of the British Isles) got together and laid out the size of the pitch and the rules so they could all play each other. Some chose to also handle the ball so Rugby was also born. In this way they laid down the rules to most of the worlds sports.The popular appeal of these games grew and spread with the British Empire.

Answer 5

I think you have answered your own question.

Football as we know it would not be football without the offside rule. Without offside, the game would be alternating goalmouth scrambles with no midfield paly.

In the nineteenth century the English used various types of offside rules to get round this. The first recorded version of football with an offside rule similar in principle to today's offside rule was in Cambridge in England in the 1840's.

When The Football Association was founded in the 1860's to produce a unified set of rules for the game, they adopted (eventually) the Cambridge offside rule.

As Britain was the major colonial power at the time and had a large merchant navy, "Association Football" (Soccer) quickly spread accross the world unlike, say, Gaelic Football, American Football and Australian Rules Football which have not really taken off globally.

Answer 6

I never knew there was a claim that the Chinese 'invented' football - that's interesting.

However, I'd be surprised if they transported it to the rest of the world, because the English were certainly playing a form of football in the 13th century, before there would really have been a chance of the game coming out of China. So it's probably fair to say that some form of ball kicking originated in a number of places (it is, in its crudest form, the most obvious game to play, really); but what we class as football now seems to have come out of England.

Answer 7

Personally i dont think we will ever know the real answer as far as society goes on out through the world someone always claims something for their culture or country its human error and as they say to the victor goes the spoils and they get to write history to their own ends ect so who knows who kick the first football or what it was even made of its like the chicken and the egg question who we will never know as i said before and for all we know it could have been the neanderthal's so i hope that solves your question lol anyhows its human nature to think that the country you come from is the best as its mostly all you know of the world thats if you dont travel ect lol : )

Answer 8

Well, English have played the way modern football is played!
Chinese invented some kind of football, but it could also be seen as similar to volley and basket ball!
There are historical evidences proving that the Greeks, more than 2,500 years ago they were playing football!

Answer 9

heheheehe
Adding in your question: In Amazonia, Indians already play football using their heads and a ball made by latex.
Some pre-coilombians already have some related ball play games.

England can do it, beacause it were center of Imerialist world, when everything started to be ranked.

Greeks already know about Earth being sphere. Chinese already now about press before gutemberg. They knew compassand had better ships. Arabians had better medicin and some talk about Bagda battery (eletricity before Volta).

We belong to a wolrd made by sofism.

Answer 10

there are many cultures that had a very similar game to football like the aztecs, but the modern form was invented in England during the victorian age, including rules and everything else

Answer 11

Because the actual shape the Chinese were kicking around was a square, and we perfected it, thinking that a ball-shape would be much better. Plus, our FA was the first in the World, therefore we refined it.

Too bad we can't play it!