Due to similarities in the shape of the ball, scoring system, and certain aspects of the game, it is easy to assume that American football is a “the son” of rugby. Although the statement is not unreasonable and has historical backing, there are nuances that place the NFL in an intermediate point between traditional football and rugby.
The current sports calendar reinforces this connection: while this Friday the Six Nations began, the oldest rugby tournament, in just over a week the Super Bowl, the grand final of American football, will be held.
However, to understand the relationship between both sports, it is necessary to go through a historical review.
The origins: from anarchy to regulation
The legend, without documentary evidence, attributes the origin of rugby to William Webb Ellis, a student at Rugby School in England, who in 1823 took the ball in his hands and ran with it, defying the rules of the game. Until then, in various English schools, young people played with the ball in a chaotic dynamic that included kicking it and hitting it with their hands, but without established rules. In his honor, the Rugby World Cup trophy bears his name.
On October 26, 1863, a turning point was marked when the first official rules of football were drafted at the Freemasons' Tavern in London. That day saw the founding of The Football Association in England, establishing a clear division between soccer and rugby.
That is why in England, soccer is known as "association football."
Meanwhile, in the United States, universities such as Yale, Princeton, Rutgers, Brown, and Columbia began playing games with different rules inspired by these new sports modalities.
The evolution of American football
The first American football game according to historical records took place on November 6, 1869, when Rutgers and Princeton faced each other under rules based on English association football. It was played with 25 players per team and only allowed kicking the ball.
However, Harvard never fully adapted to the English rules and preferred a style closer to rugby. This became evident on November 13, 1875, when Harvard and Yale played their first match under a set of hybrid rules, a game that would eventually become the famous "The Game".
On November 23, 1876, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Princeton met to establish the Intercollegiate Football Association, where many rugby rules were adopted, although with some concessions to football, such as the practice of kicking to the posts after a try, something that was not yet common in rugby in England.
Walter Camp and the birth of modern American football
American football became established as an independent sport thanks to Walter Camp, who introduced key changes:
- Reduction of players per team to 11.
- Creation of the hitting line to order the start of each play.
- Legalization of the forward pass in 1906, a modification that aimed to reduce the brutality of the game and where coach John Heisman had a fundamental influence.
This last rule was implemented after the intervention of the American president Theodore Roosevelt, who promoted measures to make the sport safer, due to the number of deaths that occurred in college games because of the high level of physical contact.
Thus, what started as a fusion between rugby and soccer ended up becoming the most profitable sport in the world, thanks to the NFL and its exponential growth.