AMERICAN FOOTBALL

The most popular sport in the US – American football – every year becomes more common throughout the world.
American football in terms of its popularity in the United States can only compete with baseball. According to an independent study that was conducted among residents of the United States, American football has become the number one sport. This jump occurred for the first time in 1972. And today this sport continues to hold its leading position.
The history of the emergence of American football is associated primarily with the history of rugby and classic English football. In 1823, in the Yorkshire county in Rugby, sixteen-year-old William Webb Ellis violated the rules while playing football – the player grabbed the ball for the first time and ran it while holding it in his hands. So in the middle of 1823 a new American game appeared – rugby, named after the city of the same name.
In 1869, in the state of New Jersey, the city of New Brunswick, a meeting took place between the teams of two universities – Priston and Rutgers. The teams played in the new American game, which was something between a football and rugby. American football received the status of an independent sport only at the end of the XIX century. And since 1960, this sport has become the most popular sport in the United States.
American football is a sport that is a team game using a special ball. The goal of the game is to advance the ball on the side of the field of the opposing team towards the test (final) zone, and you need to earn points. What does the ball can pass, throw members of your team or carry in their hands.
In American football you can score points in several ways:
bring the ball into the points area;
pass the pass to the points area;
score the ball into the goal (right between the bars).
The team that wins the most points during the entire game time wins the game.
Rules of the game
The game of American football takes place on a rectangular field with a size of 110 meters (or 120 yards), with a length of 53 meters and a width of 49 meters. At each end of the field, target lines are drawn with a distance of 100 yards from each other. Between the lines of the target and the borders of the field is a spectacle zone (10 yards). Throughout the field, every five yards, special lines are drawn, which are numbered from 10 to 50, starting from the borders of the middle and ending with the borders of the spectacle zones. At each end of the field (at its borders) there are gates, which are two tall rods with a crossbar in the middle (with a height of about three meters and a distance between the posts – 5-6 meters).
Before the start of the game, both teams line up opposite each other, near the line on which the ball lies. Next, the center player passes the ball back between his legs to another player from his team, who starts a further attack on the opponent’s field. The ball on the field, players can move only in two ways:
the player runs with the ball in his hands (this allows the player to pass the ball to other members of his team);
a player makes a ball throw (for the whole game such a “pass” can be given only once).
A goal is scored between the bars over the crossbar.
At the same time on the field can be no more than eleven players on each side. Between game periods, each team can make a substitution of players.
The entire game period in American football is divided into four main parts. They are called “quarters”, 15 minutes each. The duration of the match is – 3 hours. At the beginning of each of the gaming moments, the ball must be returned to where the previous moment was finished. Each team is entitled to four attempts to push their ball 10 yards into the points area. And if the team that owns the ball, it turns out, then it automatically gets the right to four more attempts. In the case when the team with the ball failed to advance, the right to four attempts goes to the opposite team. When the score at the end of the match becomes equal, the judge may assign 15 minutes of extra time. In this case, the winner is the team that first manages to score points. In each of the two teams there are, as in football, attack players, defense players and special players.
The game moment ends in the following cases:
when the player with the ball was knocked to the ground (the game continues from the line where it fell);
when a player with the ball moves off the field or the ball touches the ground behind the field (the game resumes from the line where the player left the field);
in the case when the passed pass was not caught by the player and the ball touches the ground (the game starts from the same line where the ball touched the ground and the team loses one of the attempts);
when one of the teams manages to score the required number of points;
during the registration of any violation.