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GAELIC FOOTBALL

The game called Gaelic football combines elements of soccer (association football) and
rugby. It is one of the most popular sports in Ireland. It is not played much outside
Ireland and the United States. Gaelic football is played by two teams of 15 members. A
game is played over two halves, usually of 30 minutes each. In senior championship
games between different counties each half lasts 35 minutes. The ball is round and is a
little smaller than a soccer ball.

Players try to score by moving up the field with the ball. They may not throw the ball, but
they may dribble with hand or foot, punch, or punt the ball toward their opponent’s goal.
A foul occurs if a player moves more than four steps without releasing the ball, bouncing
it once, or soloing it. A player performs a solo by dropping the ball and then toe-kicking
it upward back into the hands. A goal, worth three points, is scored by putting the ball
between the goalposts and under the crossbar. A single point is scored by putting the
ball between the goalposts and over the crossbar.

Gaelic football is an offshoot of a medieval British game called mêlée. Players in that
game kicked, punched, or carried a round or oval object, usually the inflated bladder of
an animal, toward a goal. It is thought that Gaelic football has been played in Ireland for
nearly 400 years. A code of rules that slightly restricted the ferocity of the sport was
adopted in 1884. In the same year the Gaelic Athletic Association was formed to govern
competition.

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The Origins of the Game Most historians place the roots of hockey in the chilly climates
of northern Europe, specifically Great Britain and France, where field hockey was a
popular summer sport more than 500 years ago. When the ponds and lakes froze in
winter, it was not unusual for the athletes who fancied that sport to play a version of it on
ice. Articles in London newspapers around that time mention increasing interest in the
sport, which many observers believe got its name from the French word “hoquet”, which
means a “bent stick.” A number of writers thought this game should be forbidden
because it was so disruptive to people out for a leisurely winter skate. Hockey Comes to
North America Not surprisingly, the earliest North American games were played in
Canada. British soldiers organized contests on frozen ponds in Halifax in the 1870s,
and about that same time in Montreal students from McGill University began facing off
against each other in a downtown ice rink. Hockey became so popular that games were
soon being played on a regular basis between clubs from Toronto, Ottawa, and
Montreal. The English Governor, Lord Stanley of Preston, was so impressed that in
1892 he bought a silver bowl with an interior gold finish and ordered that it would be
given each year to the best amateur team in Canada. That trophy, of course, is known
as the Stanley Cup and is awarded today to the winners of the National Hockey League
playoffs.

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Football
Football means different things depending on where you live. If you're in the United
Kingdom, SouthAmerica, or Africa, it usually means soccer, or the sport where two
opposing teams try to kick a roundball with alternating black and white pentagons into a
net.
In England, football might also refer to rugby football. Rugby football is played with an
oval ball. Playerscan run with the ball, pass it backwards, or kick it. Points are scored by
getting the ball over the opposing team's goal line.
If you're in Australia, football means Australian-rules football, in which an oval ball is
kicked between middle goal posts to score points. In Australian football, throwing is not
allowed, so players must bounce the ball on the ground while running.
In the United States or Canada, football means gridiron football, where opposing teams
take turns to throw or run with a brown oval ball with pointed ends until they can get a
touchdown or get far enough to kick a field goal.