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The rest of the world has been yelling and screaming at Americans to stop calling football 'soccer' for years. Apparently, that noise has gotten through to the President of the United States.
During the controversial and dragged out Draw Ceremony for the 2026 FIFA World Cup in Washington, DC on Friday afternoon, President Donald Trump appeared to suggest that Americans should stop referring to American football as 'football'.
It seems that Trump is more inclined to bestow that title upon what Americans call 'soccer' - a term invented in England to differentiate 'Association Football' from 'Rugby Football'.
'When you look at what has happened to football in the United States, again soccer in the United States - we never seem to call it that cause we have a little bit of a conflict with another thing that's called football,' Trump said during the 'Ceremonial Draw' portion of the afternoon's proceedings.
'But when you think about it, shouldn't [soccer] really be called [football]? I mean, this is football, no question about it.'
Trump added: 'We have to come up with another name for the NFL stuff because it really doesn't make sense when you think about it. This is really football.'
The move drew praise from FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who had just finished awarding Trump with the organization's first ever Peace Prize.
It was a perfect way to play to the crowd, with Trump receiving plenty of applause from the audience. On social media, the reaction was very similar.
Another said, 'Bro couldn't fix world peace but he's ready to fix the dictionary.'
'Next: metric system,' said another user. A different user said, 'That is the most (and probably only) logical thing to have ever come out of Trump's mouth.'
The drawn-out draw ended with the United States being put in the same group as Australia and Paraguay. The fourth member of the group will be decided in the UEFA playoffs between Turkiye, Romania, Slovakia and Kosovo.
It’s ironic that a debate this basic is what gets applause, but maybe it shows how desperately people want even a tiny bit of common sense in American sports culture...
During the controversial and dragged out Draw Ceremony for the 2026 FIFA World Cup in Washington, DC on Friday afternoon, President Donald Trump appeared to suggest that Americans should stop referring to American football as 'football'.
It seems that Trump is more inclined to bestow that title upon what Americans call 'soccer' - a term invented in England to differentiate 'Association Football' from 'Rugby Football'.
'When you look at what has happened to football in the United States, again soccer in the United States - we never seem to call it that cause we have a little bit of a conflict with another thing that's called football,' Trump said during the 'Ceremonial Draw' portion of the afternoon's proceedings.
'But when you think about it, shouldn't [soccer] really be called [football]? I mean, this is football, no question about it.'
Trump added: 'We have to come up with another name for the NFL stuff because it really doesn't make sense when you think about it. This is really football.'
The move drew praise from FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who had just finished awarding Trump with the organization's first ever Peace Prize.
It was a perfect way to play to the crowd, with Trump receiving plenty of applause from the audience. On social media, the reaction was very similar.
Another said, 'Bro couldn't fix world peace but he's ready to fix the dictionary.'
'Next: metric system,' said another user. A different user said, 'That is the most (and probably only) logical thing to have ever come out of Trump's mouth.'
The drawn-out draw ended with the United States being put in the same group as Australia and Paraguay. The fourth member of the group will be decided in the UEFA playoffs between Turkiye, Romania, Slovakia and Kosovo.
It’s ironic that a debate this basic is what gets applause, but maybe it shows how desperately people want even a tiny bit of common sense in American sports culture...
