Hello again, and welcome back to Britain under the Microscope.
Hello Anlan.
Hello everybody.
So Anlan, do you know what is going to happen in the coming days and coming months actually?
Well, it has to be the World Cup!
Yes, the World Cup in Russia this year. Are you a football fan?
Not in the slightest.
But none the less. Let's talk about football because you're from a country that has lots of football fans.
Well, exactly. In the UK football is the most popular sport. And obviously we call it football, we don't call it soccer.
Soccer is the American term.
Which we talk about in the previous episode that you did.
Yeah, actually you mentioned it. I have down an episode on football which was in earlier episode.
So in your previous episode you talked a little bit about balls, football, you talked about the people involved. But in this episode we're gonna talk a little bit about its history. And also give you some more expressions and phrases about football that we use in everyday English.
And also football in the UK. So first of all you talked about history, so when did it start? This whole football you know the premier league and all that?
Well, the football association the FA. We set up in England in 1863.
1863 that was quite a while ago.
Yeah, but compare to other sports. It's quite recent. And it was in that year that modern rules as we know today were full set up. And after this, you have the FA cup in 1871.
So would you say that football is the national sport for British, for English?
Oh, definitely. Cricket is being around a lot longer.
Cricket是板球。Cricket is something that I don't understand at all.
Oh, yeah. It's quite difficult to understand if you're not used to cricket. But I would say now the football is the main sport of the UK, it's the most popular sport by far.
Now apart from World Cup where countries compete against other countries, usually you have a lot of league games that would be just based on different clubs different football clubs competing against each other right?
Yeah.
So when was the first football club established, founded in the UK.
Well, the first football club was Sheffield FC in 1857.
Well, that's 150 years ago.
Yeah, so that's the first football club, and now in the UK you think about the big clubs like Manchester United or ManUtd, Chelsea, and Arsenal. But there're hundreds and actually thousands of registered football clubs and football teams in the UK. There are now over 40,000.
Over 40,000 clubs?
Yeah, that's twice as many as there're in Brazil.
Brazil is obviously being another big football country.
Yeah.
Over 40000. Especially thinking that Britain is really not that big a country I mean populationwise and everything. But most of the times I think people outside of the UK only watch the Premier League英超。Those are the best teams, like you said some of the names, even for a nonfootball fan, I know Manchester United曼聯，Chelsea切爾西 and Arsenal阿森納。
Yeah. So that's all part of the premier league, but the premier league has only been around for 20 or so years, it's quite recent.
So back to the topic that we were originally mentioning the World Cup. So what about the World Cup? Has England won the World Cup before?
Well, you would think that since England in UK is the country where modern football started, you would thought we have won it quite a few times.
Yes.
But we only have won it once.
For many of the games, it is seen as a strong team, but it only won the World Cup once?
Yeah. That was in 1966.
Quite a while ago.
Well, quite a while ago. But many people still talk about it in the UK. And it was actually quite an eventful World Cup as well. It was hosted in the UK in London.
In your home turf.
But the actual World Cup itself was stolen before the game.
Oh, you mean the cup, the actual cup.
Yeah. And it was founded in the bushes by a dog named Pickles.
Ah, I bet that might make the news.

Well it did. And it's still a bit of mystery on who exactly stole it, because apparently they wanted it to ransom it. It's all a bit of mystery exactly what happened?
This was before the World Cup.
Yeah, absolutely.
You know when you mention football in the UK, I mean apart from your football fans and the stars the clubs, they think of the UK or England and football and they probably would think the Hooligans足球流氓。That's the darker side of football and you see I've seen videos of people beating others up just because they're supporting different clubs.
Yeah, football hooliganism has got a bad reputation in the UK. And you're right it's these fans who are normally violent or they're beating up supporters of another team, or they've drunk too much they're completely drunk. But to be perfectly honest, it is lesser an issue than it's used to be. I'm not saying it doesn't happen anymore, but in the 1990s and the turn of millennium the government really crackdown on it. It still happens but lesser so than before. There is much great control over it than it used to be.
Yeah, that because it was probably really turning into a huge problem.
Well, it's affecting our reputation as well and it got us a state where for example people would feel so embarrassed where in football shirts and things like that.
Afraid of getting beaten up by fans of the rival team.
But also the association.
Yeah. I always remember when I was in London I was meeting up with this friend in a pub, and it was two of the teams were playing that night. And he said "woo, I'd better not let others know because this seems to be the supporters of team A and I support team B".
Yeah, well there're some kind of the pubs where fans and particular club they come together. But more often than not you go to any pub in the UK, and you'll see supporters of different teams together watching the game.
So it is not that scary.
It's not that scary, no.
So talking about the actual expressions related to football or expressions that come from football game. They're lots in English.
Oh they're loads. If you can see that how popular football actually is in the UK, there are loads of phases and expressions that we use in Everyday speech. So for example, you talked a few of those in your previous episode.
Changing the goalposts.
Yeah, absolutely.
What else?
So we can also say "get the ball rolling".
Get the ball rolling, to start something.
Yeah. So for example let's get the ball rolling on this project.
開球。To start, kick start something.
And also "to know the score", that's quite a British Expression.
To know the score, what does that mean? Does that mean you know the situation what is going on?
Yeah, you know the basic facts, the essential facts of situation.And we can also say "you're on the ball", "to be on the ball".
"To be on the ball" would be a bit unstable, wouldn't it?
No, not really. It's the opposite. "To be on the ball" it's… the metaphor is someone who is chasing the ball, who is focus on the ball. So to be on the ball it means to be aware and alert of what is going around you.
So you actually are aware of what is going on.
Yeah. Because you're looking out for other people who are trying to take the ball away from you and you can also say "you get a kick out of something".
"Get a kick out of something" here kick if I remember correctly here a kick is excitement.
Yeah. So that means to enjoy activity or event very much.
For example you can say I get a kick out of watching football.
Yeah. Just means you enjoy it very much. And you can also say "a game changer".
Oh, here game would be 比賽，wouldn't it? A match, so "game changer" this is something some new ideas that are changing the rules.
So it changes and creates a new way of doing something or thinking about something. We use it a lot in business.
So can I say online learning is a big game changer in education?
Yeah, absolutely. Because it's forcing people to think of things in a different way and to act in a different way, so there're plenty more expressions about football. But we'll leave it there for the moment.
I think if we continue discussing, people will know that we're really not football fans.
Yeah, I have to admit that I had to do quite a bit research for this episode.
So all of you who are football fans out there leave a comment and or share what you know. Maybe we can all learn in this community.
Well, I definitely learn something more as well.
We'll see you next time.
Bye.
Bye.

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