Have you ever been confused when someone is talking about football, only to find out that they were actually referring to rugby during the entire conversation?
Rugby is sometimes called football because rugby originated from football. The game started in 1823 when a seventeen year old Wiliam Webb Ellis first picked up a football and ran with it in a town called ‘Rugby’ in England, hence the sport ‘Rugby Football’ was born.
Most early rugby clubs were called ‘rugby football’ clubs and some of them have kept the ‘football’ part of the club’s name as a tribute to the past and some have dropped the ‘football’ part over the years.
For example, one of the oldest clubs in the world, Blackheath Rugby Club, used to be called Blackheath Rugby Football Club, you can read an interesting history of this club here.
Depending on where you are in the world, sometimes you will hear rugby and football used to describe the sport that is most commonly known as rugby union to most people. This can be confusing, especially to Americans who only think of football as the sport played by NFL stars.
In this article, we are going to dive into the roots of the sport of rugby to help you understand why you sometimes hear people refer to rugby as football.
Why Rugby Is Called Football
What many people don’t know is that rugby actually started out as football. It has gone through many evolutions of both getting a new name and changes to the rules to make it the sport that most people know today as rugby.
The sport started out as a form of football being played at the Rugby School, a private all-boys school in England, in the early 1800s.
At Rugby School, in the town of Rugby, the boys played football often but there are reports that players in 1823 made some changes to the standard football game rules. These changes include deciding to pick up the ball and run with it and including much more contact and tackling.
‘In 1823, William Webb Ellis, a pupil at Rugby School, caught the ball and ran with it.
With this “fine disregard for the rules”, Webb Ellis is credited with inventing the game of rugby football as distinct from its kicking counterparts.
– World Rugby (source)
This is how rugby as we know it was born. It was called Rugby Football because it was the version of football played by the boys going to school at the Rugby School.
Over the years, it has come to be known interchangeably as rugby, football, or many other denominations of those two words. In England some clubs still have the name Rugby.
Curiously, in Australia people also call rugby union – rugby, and rugby league – football. My rugby league mates from down under assure me that rugby union is also known as rugby yawnion since it is a much slower game than rugby league – in their eyes.
All that said, William Web Ellis is credited with starting the game that we now know as rugby union. In honor of his ‘achievement’ the name of the world cup trophy is the William Web Ellis trophy, pictured below.
Learn a little more about the history of rugby union, here: 14 History Facts Every Rugby Fan Should Know!
Is A Rugby Ball Called A Football In Some Countries?
A rugby ball is referred to as a football in Australia. Most other countries simply call it a rugby ball, or just a ball. The other exception is in America where American Football uses a similar shaped ball which they call a football and so this has led many people to call a rugby ball a football also.
In Europe, however, a rugby ball is a rugby ball and a football is a football, if only it were as simple the world over.
In America, the difference between rugby and football is very straightforward. There is little to no confusion over the two different sports. Both sports are played at the youth, high school, college, and pro levels, but players who play one or the other are very specific about which one they play.
English people do not play American football, so English people actually find it confusing that Americans also have a game of football that is different from their football (rugby) which Americans call ‘soccer’.
The only other names for a rugby ball that you might come across, are: the egg, for obvious reasons, ‘the pill’ because you need to look after it, and possibly ‘Gilbert’, because that is the name of the supplier of international match balls and popular the world over.
Why not try our General Rugby Knowledge Quiz here, or our guide to Rugby Slang here.
Is A Rugby Ball The Same As An American Football?
| Feature | Rugby Ball | American Football |
| Length | 28-29cm/11-11.4in | 28-29.3cm/11-11.5 in |
| Circumference | 58-62cm/23–24in | 24.4-22.8mm/28-28.5 in |
| Weight | 410-460gm/14-16oz | 397-425gm/14-15oz |
| End shape | Curved | Pointed |
Definitely check out: Rugby Ball Size And Weight guide For Age Groups for more information.
Don’t go trying to bring a rugby ball to an American football game, or vice versa. Although it could technically be done, purists of either sport will not want to play rugby with a football or football with a rugby ball.
To the untrained eye, rugby balls and American footballs look very similar. They are both an oval or ellipse shape, but that is where the similarities end. They are similar sized, but they actually do have a very different shape due to the mechanics of the games they are designed for.
Although both an American football and a rugby ball are roughly the same shape and are both about 11-12 inches long, there are some distinct differences that set the two types of balls apart.
If you were to hold them up next to each other, you can clearly see that the American football comes to a sharp point at each end and has more of an arc to the roundest part of the ball. Rugby balls come to more of a softened, rounded end and have a less drastic arc or curve in the ball shape.
Another distinct difference between rugby balls and American footballs is that rugby balls come in a few different standard regulation sizes whereas American footballs come in just one size.
Rugby balls come in 3 recognized official sizes and several other unofficial sizes for young children. American footballs have slight deviations between youth, college, and professional balls, but the size differences are less distinct.
Don’t let all of the different names and terminology used in rugby put you off! Rugby is a game for everyone so why not get down your local rugby club and get involved!
You might also be interested in: Rugby And Football Boot Differences And Similarities (Explainer)
Image Credits
Webb Ellis Cup, the trophy awarded to the winner of the Rugby World Cup. Carrington & Co, London (trophy, based on the cup and cover by Paul de Lamerie) Roman.b (derivative work), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
