Having just had the satisfaction of sitting in New York watching the New York Giants win the Superbowl, I have had plenty of time to reflect on Simon Kuper’s article in the Weekend FT on why US sports have not spread around the world like British sports - notably soccer and cricket.

Among the oddities of American football is, of course, the fact that a game that only takes an hour on the clock actually lasts for three hours or more. The drama is even more drawn out by the proliferation of Superbowl ads, which can be viewed here and briefly summarised here.

Simon’s piece interestingly analysed why American football has not been picked up elsewhere, despite some outreach efforts by the National Football League, including staging one regular season game in London last year.

He did not mention the fact that American football has a fragile grip as an amateur sport even in the US. Many boys do not play it until high school (for those 14 or 15 years old and up). Instead, many younger boys and girls play soccer, as well as basketball, softball and other sports.

It strikes me that American football is actually a rather un-American game because it is not accessible. As every child knows, all you really need to play soccer is a few kids and a ball. American football is a much tougher and more strategic game that requires lots of players, lots of padding and quite a bit of grand strategy.

Even if, pace Simon’s piece, the US had been a more successful imperial country, I think it would have had a lot of difficulty popularising such a complicated game.

February 4th, 2008 in Sports | Permalink