Over the years, the sport adopted more Americanized rules, though it retained some of its historical features, including a 110-yard (100 m) field, 12-player teams, and three downs instead of four. Canadian football remained akin to rugby for decades, though a progressive faction of players, chiefly based in the western provinces, demanded changes to the game based on the innovations in American football. Another consequential change was the adoption of the forward pass in 1906, which allowed the quarterback to throw the ball forward over the line of scrimmage to a receiver. Many of these early innovations were the work of Walter Camp, including the sport's line of scrimmage and the system of downs. Īmerican football teams and organizations subsequently adopted new rules which distinguished the game from rugby. colleges over the next several years using these rules. Harvard took a liking to McGill's rugby-style rules, and subsequently played several other U.S. In 1874, Harvard and McGill organized two games using each other's rules. Meanwhile, McGill University in Montreal used rules based on rugby union. While several American schools adopted rules based on the soccer rules of the English Football Association, Harvard University held to its traditional "carrying game".
Later in the 1860s, teams from universities were playing each other, leading to more standardized rules and the creation of college football. The earliest recorded instance of gridiron football occurred at University of Toronto's University College in November 1861. Early games had a variety of local rules and were generally similar to modern rugby union and soccer. The sport developed from informal games played in North America during the 19th century. The International Federation of American Football (IFAF), uses "American football" inclusive of Canadian football and other varieties. This is still called a gridiron, so the pattern changed, but the name did not.
By 1920, the grid system was abandoned in favor of the system of yard lines and hash marks used today. The ball would be snapped in the grid in which it was downed on the previous play.
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The two sports are also sometimes known as "gridiron football." The name originated with the sport's once-characteristic playing field: the original American football and Canadian football fields were marked by a series of parallel lines along both the width and length of the field, which produced a checkerboard pattern resembling a cross-hatched cooking gridiron. Various sources use the term "North American football" when discussing the American and Canadian games together, but this term is quite rare. The sport is typically known as simply "football" in the countries where it originated, regardless of the specific variety. In this period, lines were painted along the length of the field as well as the width, making a checkerboard pattern. The international governing body for the sport is the International Federation of American Football (IFAF) although the organization plays all of its international competitions under American rules, it uses a definition of the game that is broad enough that it includes Canadian football under its umbrella, and Football Canada (the governing body for Canadian football) is an IFAF member.Ī 1904 diagram of an American football field. Both varieties are distinguished from other football sports by their use of hard plastic helmets and shoulder pads, the forward pass, the system of downs, a number of unique rules and positions, measurement in customary units of yards (even in Canada, which largely metricated in the 1970s), and a distinctive brown leather ball in the shape of a prolate spheroid with pointed ends.
American and Canadian football developed alongside (but independently from) each other and were originally more distinct before Canadian teams adopted features of the American game and vice versa. These sports originated in the 19th century out of older games related to modern rugby football, more specifically rugby union football. Football is played at professional, collegiate, high school, semi-professional, and amateur levels. Other derivative varieties include arena football, football for smaller teams (most commonly eight players), flag football and amateur games such as touch and street football.
American football, which uses 11-player teams, is the form played in the United States and the best known form of gridiron football worldwide, while Canadian football, featuring 12-player teams, predominates in Canada. Gridiron football, also known as North American football or, in North America, simply football, is a family of football team sports primarily played in the United States and Canada. Diagram of a Canadian football field, wider and longer than the American field
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