Definition of American Football

As its name suggests, American football has its origins in a country American, USA. It's a sport which emerged in the late 19th century as a variant of British rugby, which in turn is a different version of football.

Basic rules

Two teams of 11 players each face each other on a court with a length of 100 yards divided into 10 equal parts and during four periods of 15 minutes. The main objective of the game is that each team carry the oval ball to the other end of the field to score a touchdown. Each team has four opportunities or downs to advance 10 yards, which are marked on the field of play.

If you can advance 10 yards or more, you have four other opportunities to move the ball forward, which can be done in several ways (running with the ball in hand or passing the ball forward to another player). At the same time, the opposing team tries to impede the advance of the ball. In this way, the members of each team try to advance their position while rivals try to prevent it.

Strategic games, in which to anticipate the opponent's moves

In the event that after 3 attempts they have not managed to advance 10 yards, they will most likely kick the ball to move the opponent away from the end zone. If they manage to advance with the ball towards the opposite extreme zone, a touchdown will be scored, which is worth 6 points or 7 points if they kick the ball and it crosses the goalposts of the rival goal. Another option is to kick a field goal in the fourth chance, as long as the team is close to the posts and has not managed to advance 10 yards in the three previous opportunities (in this case the goal is worth 3 points).

The terminology of American football

In each sport there are a series of terms that are necessary to understand the dynamic of the game and all the culture related to it. As for the players, there are the attackers (known as quarterbacks), the receivers are the wide receivers, the fastest are the runningbacks and the center is the one who puts the ball in play.

In the media communication it is very frequent to speak of the All Pro Team, which would be the team ideal. The assistant coach or coach are called assistant coaches. The visiting team is the Away game and one of the main judges of the match is the back judge.