Football or Soccer

The UK and the US are often described as two nations divided by a common language, and nothing illustrates that as well as the confusion over the use of the word 'football'. For the rest of the world, football is absolutely synonymous with soccer. For the US, football refers almost exclusively to that peculiar game with the wrong-shaped ball, which is neither soccer or rugby or recognisable as any sport played elsewhere.
The popularity of what the rest of the work knows as 'American Football' has ebbed and flowed on foreign shores. Occasional games are played abroad to publicise the sport internationally, and many countries have their own specialist leagues. These leagues are hardly mainstream, though naturally they have their own football trophies and league tables.