h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Football (Soccer)

FOOTBALL (in America its called soccer) was first created and player professionally in ENGLAND (small nation on a small island), football was England’s third greatest invention ever (after Irony and Toilet Jokes), there is another AMERICAN version of football (aptly called AMERICAN FOOTBALL), but that version is rubbish so I won’t mention it again.

Football is a simple but complicated game, its aim is to score goals, BY USING ANY PART OF YOUR BODY (usually the feet) EXCEPT YOUR ARMS, which is to SCORE by hitting a spherical ball under a rectangular arch. This is a GOAL. If you score more goals than the other TEAM you WIN the competition of lower-body aimed sphere
whacking.

Note : make sure you get the right arch, there are rectangular arches on a rectangular "pitch" (or field) two arches to confuse you)

It is not that simple and easy though (if it was like that football wouldn't be the world's greatest most popular sport) NO! Because there is (most usually) another team of PLAYERS, who want to take the ball from you and put it under THEIR arch!!! They MUST be stopped by you.

Note : Two spherical balls are NOT allowed on the same pitch at the same time, no matter how diplomatic and sensible this logic may be.

A goalkeeper usually guards each arch, he IS allowed to use his arms, as long has he stays in his even smaller rectangular area.
But if anyone else uses their arms this is illegal, and called a HANDBALL, and if you do this in your goalkeepers area, a PENALTY is awarded to the opposing team, and they will be allowed to put the ball on a spot a kick it into the arch, trying avoid the desperate
goalkeeper.

An non-affiliated human being is usually on the pitch, he is called the REFEREE, although he has the power to expel naughty players from the pitch (if they hurt other players, cheat, says rude words or handball) he makes IMPARTIAL decisions, however if a player tells the referee that he is not impartial, that player shall be sent off as the referees feelings are hurt easily.

There is also a mythical rule called the OFFSIDE RULE, however the original transcript of this rule has been lost in the mists of time, and no one knows if it really exists, and if so what it does mean. However offside rule usually occur when your team SCORES and the referee says it wasn't a goal due to the offside ruling. The only people who really think they know what it is are referees, and they only hand down the secret of offside
rulings only to other referees.

As one wise guy once said about the game “It’s a game of two halves”, he was wise because this is true, a whole game of football is equally divided into two halves of play, so players can have a rest and eat oranges.

Another less wiser guy once said - “Football - game of the foot” - That wise guy was me.

The mystery of the offside rule:

In general, there is an easy way to judge this rule. If a team is called offside by the referee, their supporters will either roar with frustration (clearly offside), roar with disgust (likely to be offside), or roar with disbelief (probably not offside - although this is no guarentee). Also, look to see how relieved the defending team is.

The officials make mistakes, every now and then. There are many theories as to why this is, most are to do with eyesight, parentage, or other such unsavoury things.

Just to elaborate further, players don't have to kick the ball. Another option is to kick players of the opposing team. This option is fairly popular.