Soccer Trivia and Facts

There's nothing like a little bit of trivia to test your knowledge of the sport of soccer. You may say that soccer is your favorite sport, but how much do you really know? Following are some facts and tidbits that you may or may not know about soccer.
· Soccer originated generally in its present form in Britain.
· The world's oldest club formed in 1857 is Sheffield FC
· Soccer is the most played and most watched sport on Earth
· Soccer is called football in practically every country except America, who call 'Grid Iron' football and football soccer.
· Famous soccer rivalries include the Old Firm (Scotland), Manchester derby, London derbies, Milan derby, Real vs Barcelona, and many more.
· Some famous soccer players: Pele, Maradonna, Charlton, Eusebio, Cruyff, Dalglish, Ronaldo, Beckham, Mattheus.
Those are some basic bits of soccer trivia and facts. How much did you know? Well, here are so more soccer facts to test your knowledge:
· The sport of Association Football (often referred to as soccer or simply football) is the most popular team sport in the world, in both number of spectators and number of active participants.
· The largest attendance for a soccer match ever was 199,854 people - Brazil v. Uruguay in the World Cup at the Maracana Municipal Stadium, Rio de Janeiro, July 1950.
· In the largest soccer tournament ever, no less than 5,098 teams competed in 1999 for the second Bangkok League Seven-a-Side Competition. Over 35,000 players involved!
· The most goals scored by one player in a single soccer match was 16
- Stephan Stanis (France) playing for Racing Club de Lens in December 1942.
· Based on video evidence, one of the fastest ever scored was in 2.8 seconds by Ricardo Olivera (Uruguay) in December 1998.
· The international governing body of soccer is the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), based in Zurich, Switzerland.
· Diego Maradona was only 16 when he made his soccer debut for Argentina.
· Soccer goalies didn't have to wear different coloured shirts from their teammates until 1913.
· Eusebio scored 46 goals in the European Cup for Benfica.
· Chris Woods once went 1196 minutes without conceding a goal while at Rangers, from between November 26 1986 and January 31 1987.
· Ryan Giggs' dad was a professional Rugby League player.
· In 1973, the entire Galilee team spent the night in jail for kicking their opponents during an Israeli League game.
Have you had enough soccer trivia and facts? These are only a few of the interesting soccer facts that are floating around out there.
Anne Clarke writes numerous articles for websites on gardening, parenting, fashion, sports, and home decor. Her background includes teaching and gardening. For more of her articles on soccer, please visit Soccer Products and Info.