Ball (association football)

Adidas Telstar-style ball, with the familiar black and white truncated icosahedron pattern.

A football, soccer ball, or association football ball is the ball used in the sport of association football. The name of the ball varies according to whether the sport is called "football", "soccer", or "association football". The ball's spherical shape, as well as its size, weight, and material composition, are specified by Law 2 of the Laws of the Game maintained by the International Football Association Board. Additional, more stringent, standards are specified by FIFA and subordinate governing bodies for the balls used in the competitions they sanction.

Early footballs began as animal bladders or stomachs that would easily fall apart if kicked too much. Improvements became possible in the 19th century with the introduction of rubber and discoveries of Vulcanization by Charles Goodyear. The modern 32-panel ball design was developed in 1962 by Eigil Nielsen, and technological research continues today to develop footballs with improved performance.

History

Leather ball used in the football tournament at the 1936 Summer Olympics.

In 1863, the first specifications for footballs were laid down by the Football Association. Previous to this, footballs were made out of inflated leather, with later leather coverings to help footballs maintain their shapes.^[1] In 1872 the specifications were revised, and these rules have been left essentially unchanged as defined by the International Football Association Board. Differences in footballs created since this rule came into effect have been to do with the material used in their creation.

Footballs have gone through a dramatic change over time. During medieval times balls were normally made from an outer shell of leather filled with cork shavings.^[2] Another method of creating a ball was using animal bladders for the inside of the ball making it inflatable. However, these two styles of creating footballs made it easy for the ball to puncture and were inadequate for kicking. It was not until the 19th century that footballs developed into what a football looks like today.

Vulcanization

In 1838, Charles Goodyear introduced the use of rubber and their discoveries of vulcanisation, which dramatically improved the football.^[3] Vulcanization is the treatment of rubber to give it certain qualities such as strength, elasticity, and resistance to solvents. Vulcanization of rubber also helps the football resist moderate heat and cold. Vulcanization helped create inflatable bladders that pressurise the outer panel arrangement of the football. Charles Goodyear's innovation increased the bounce ability of the ball and made it easier to kick. Most of the balls of this time had tanned leather with eighteen sections stitched together. These were arranged in six panels of three strips each.^[4][5]

Reasons for improvement

During the 1900s, footballs were made out of rubber and leather which was perfect for bouncing and kicking the ball; however, when heading the football (hitting it with the player's head) it was usually painful. This problem was most probably due to water absorption of the leather from rain, which caused a considerable increase in weight, causing head or neck injury. Another problem of early footballs was that they deteriorated quickly, as the leather used in manufacturing the footballs varied in thickness and in quality.^[4]

Present developments

Adidas Torfabrik football used in the Bundesliga in 2011

Elements of the football that today are tested are the deformation of the football when it is kicked or when the ball hits a surface. Two styles of footballs have been tested by the Sports Technology Research Group of Wolfson School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering in Loughborough University; these two models are called the Basic FE model and the Developed FE model of the football. The basic model considered the ball as being a spherical shell with isotropic material properties. The developed model also utilised isotropic material properties but included an additional stiffer stitching seam region.

Future developments

Companies such as Umbro, Mitre, Adidas, Nike, Select and Puma are releasing footballs made out of new materials which are intended to provide more accurate flight and more power to be transferred to the football.^[6][7]

Construction

Today's footballs are more complex than past footballs. Most modern footballs consist of twelve regular pentagonal and twenty regular hexagonal panels positioned in a truncated icosahedron spherical geometry.^[2] Some premium-grade 32-panel balls use non-regular polygons to give a closer approximation to sphericality.^[8] The inside of the football is made up of a latex bladder which enables the football to be pressurised. The ball's panel pairs are stitched along the edge; this procedure can either be performed manually or with a machine.^[3] The size of a soccer ball is roughly 22 cm (8.65 inches) in diameter for a regulation size 5 ball. Rules state that a size 5 ball must be 68 to 70 cm in circumference. Averaging that to 69 cm and then dividing by π gives about 22 cm for a diameter.

The ball's weight must be in the range of 410 to 450 grams (14 to 16 oz) and inflated to a pressure of between 0.6 and 1.1 bars (8.5 and 15.6 psi) at sea level.^[9]

There are a number of different types of football balls depending on the match and turf including: training footballs, match footballs, professional match footballs, beach footballs, street footballs, indoor footballs, turf balls, futsal footballs and mini/skills footballs.^[10]

Suppliers

Many companies throughout the world produce footballs.^[11] The earliest balls were made by local suppliers where the game was played. It is estimated that 40% of all footballs are made in Sialkot, Pakistan, with other major producers being China and India.^[12]

As a response to the problems with the balls in the 1962 FIFA World Cup, Adidas created the Adidas Santiago^[13] – this led to Adidas winning the contract to supply the match balls for all official FIFA and UEFA matches, which they have held since the 1970s, and also supplied match balls for the 2008 Olympic Games.^[14] They also supply the ball for the UEFA Champions League which is called the Adidas Finale.

FIFA World Cup

The following footballs were used in the FIFA World Cup finals tournaments:

World Cup	Ball(s)	Image	Manufacturer	Additional information	Refs
1930	Tiento (first half) T-model (second half)			Two different balls were used in the final: Argentina supplied the first-half ball (the 'Tiento') and led 2–1 at the break; hosts Uruguay supplied the second-half ball (the 'T-Model' which was larger and heavier)[13] and won 4–2.	[13][15]
1934	Federale 102		ECAS (Ente Centrale Approvvigionamento Sportivi), Rome		[16]
1938	Allen		Allen, Paris		[17]
1950	Duplo T		Superball		[18]
1954	Swiss World Champion		Kost Sport, Basel	The first 18-panel ball.	[15][19]
1958	Top Star		Sydsvenska Läder och Remfabriken, Ängelholm (aka "Remmen" or "Sydläder")	Chosen from 102 candidates in a blind test by four FIFA officials.	[20][21]
1962	Crack Top Star		Senor Custodio Zamora H., San Miguel, Chile Remmen	The Crack was the official ball. Referee Ken Aston was unimpressed with the Chilean ball provided for the opening match, and sent for a European ball, which arrived in the second half. Various matches used different balls, with the apparent rumour the European teams didn't trust the locally produced ball[13]	[13][15][20][22]
1966	Challenge 4-star		Slazenger	18-panel ball in orange or yellow. Selected in a blind test at the Football Association headquarters in Soho Square.	[15][23]
1970	Telstar		Adidas	Telstar was the first 32-panel black-and-white ball used in the FIFA World Cup finals. Only 20 were supplied by adidas. A brown ball (Germany-Peru) and a white ball (first half of Italy-Germany) were used in some matches.	[15][24]
1974	Telstar Durlast		Adidas		[15]
1978	Tango		Adidas		[15]
1982	Tango España		Adidas		[15]
1986	Azteca		Adidas	First fully synthetic FIFA World Cup ball and first hand-sewed ball	[15]
1990	Etrusco Unico		Adidas		[15]
1994	Questra[25]		Adidas		[15]
1998	Tricolore		Adidas	[15] First multi-coloured ball at a World Cup finals tournament. The ball that Adidas created for the following year's Women's World Cup, the Icon, was technically identical to the Tricolore.	[15][26]
2002	Fevernova		Adidas	First World Cup ball with a triangular design.	[15]
2006	Teamgeist		Adidas	The Teamgeist is a 14-panel ball. Each match at the World Cup finals had its own individual ball, printed with the date of the match, the stadium and the team names.[14] It was replaced for the final match by the gold-coloured Teamgeist Berlin.	[15]
	Teamgeist Berlin
2010	Jabulani		Adidas	This ball has 8 panels. The ball for the final match was the gold Jo'bulani (picture on the left), which was named after "Jo'burg", a standard South African nickname for Johannesburg, site of the final game.	[15][27]
	Jo'bulani
2014	Brazuca		Adidas	This is the first FIFA World Cup ball named by the fans. The ball has been made of six polyurethane panels which have been thermally bonded.	[28]
	Brazuca Final Rio
2015 (women)	Conext15		Adidas	Based on the technology introduced in the Brazuca. The Conext15 Final Vancouver is the first ball created specifically for a Women's World Cup Final.	[29]
	Conext15 Final Vancouver

UEFA European Championship

The following balls were used in the UEFA European Championship over the years:^[30]

Championship	Official football	Manufacturer	Additional information
1968	Telstar Elast	Adidas	This the first championship use of this ball[13]
1972	Telstar	Adidas
1976	Telstar	Adidas
1980	Tango Italia	Adidas
1984	Tango Mundial	Adidas
1988	Tango Europa	Adidas
1992	Etrusco Unico	Adidas	This was the same ball used as in the 1990 FIFA World Cup.
1996	Questra Europa	Adidas
2000	Terrestra Silverstream	Adidas
2004	Roteiro	Adidas
2008	Europass	Adidas
2012	Tango 12	Adidas
2016	Beau Jeu	Adidas	Elements of the Adidas Brazuca in a new design
	Fracas		Design variant of the Beau Jeu

Olympic Games

The following balls were used in the football tournament of the Olympic Games (note this list is incomplete):

Olympic Games	Official football	Manufacturer	Additional information
1984 Olympic Games	Adidas Tango Sevilla	Adidas
1988 Olympic Games	Adidas Tango Séoul	Adidas
1992 Olympic Games	Adidas Etrusco Unico	Adidas
1996 Olympic Games	Adidas Questra Olympia[31]	Adidas
2000 Olympic Games	Adidas Gamarada[13]	Adidas	The aboriginal word for friendship, variation of the Adidas Terrestra Silverstream[13]
2004 Olympic Games	Adidas Pelias	Adidas
2008 Olympic Games	Adidas Teamgeist 2 Magnus Moenia	Adidas	Variation of the Teamgeist, with Magnus Moenia meaning 'walls of the great' in Latin[32]
2012 Olympic Games	Adidas The Albert	Adidas	Variant of the Adidas Tango 12
2016 Olympic Games	Adidas Errejota	Adidas	Variant of the Adidas Beau Jeu

League balls

The following lists the most up-to-date balls used in various club football competitions:

Ball	League Name
Voit	Liga MX
Nike Ordem 3	Premier League
Adidas Torfabrik	Bundesliga
Nike Ordem 3	La Liga
Derbystar Brillant APS	KNVB Eredivisie
Puma King Ball	Primera Division
Golty	Categoría Primera A
Nike Ordem	Campeonato Brasileiro Série A
Nike Ordem 3	Serie A
Adidas Pro Ligue 1	Ligue 1
Adidas Argentum	Argentine Primera División
Adidas Brazuca	Russian Premier League
Adidas Errejota	Primeira Liga
Nike Incyte	Süper Lig
Adidas Brazuca	Superleague Greece
Nike Maxim	Liga I
Mitre Delta V12	Scottish Premiership
Adidas Brazuca	J1 League
Adidas Brazuca	K League Classic
Puma	Parva Liga
Puma	Ekstraklasa
Adidas Brazuca	/ Major League Soccer
Nike Incyte	Chinese Super League
Nike Incyte	A-League
Nike Ordem 2	I-League
Mitre REVOLVE FL	Welsh Premier League
Molten VG-5000A	United Football League
Adidas Brazuca	Tippeligaen
Adidas Finale	UEFA Champions League
Select Brilliant Super	Belgian First Division A
Select Brilliant Super	Danish Superliga
Select Brilliant Super	Veikkausliiga
Mitre Delta V12	National Premier Soccer League
Voit	/ National Premier Soccer League
Puma evoPower 1 S	Indian Super League
Nike Ordem 3 NWSL 2016	National Women's Soccer League
Nike Ordem 3	Saudi Premier League

Unicode

Unicode 5.2 introduces the glyph ⚽ (U+26BD SOCCER BALL), representable in HTML as ⚽ or ⚽.^[33] The addition of this symbol follows a 2008 proposal by Karl Pentzlin.^[34]

See also

• Ball (Gridiron football)
• Football (ball)

References

1. football World – Early History Archived 16 June 2006 at the Wayback Machine. (Accessed 9 June 2006)
2. Price, D. S., Jones, R.Harland, A. R. 2006. Computational modeling of manually stitched footballs. Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers – Part L — Journal of Materials: Design & Applications. Vol. 220 Issue 4, p259-268.
3. Materials Science and Engineering: A Volume 420, Issues 1–2, 25 March 2006, Pages 100–108
4. Viscoelasticity of multi-layer textile reinforced polymer composites used in footballs. Journal of Materials Science. Volume 43, Number 8 / April 2008. 2833–2843.
5. "Oldest Soccer Ball". soccerballworld.com. 2013. Retrieved 16 August 2013.
6. football World – 2000 and Beyond (Accessed 9 June 2006)
7. "World's First Intelligent Soccer Ball Receives FIFA Recognition". PR Newswire. Retrieved 2015-07-21.
8. Eastaway, Rob; Haigh, John (2005-10-15). "Balls; and why theyaren't quite spherical". How to Take a Penalty: The Hidden Mathematics of Sport. Robson. pp. 4–5. ISBN 9781861058362.
9. "Laws of the Game 2013/2014" (PDF). www.fifa.com. FIFA.
10. Soccer Balls, Soccer, 2013-10-14. Retrieved: 2013-10-14.
11. "Best soccer ball brands". Soccer Gear HQ.
12. wright, tom (28 April 2010). "A Soccer Sore Point". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 28 June 2014.
13. The Blizzard: Issue 6. 2012. ISBN 978-1-908940-06-3.
14. football World – Team Geist (Accessed 9 June 2006)
15. "The Footballs during the FIFA World Cup". Football Facts. FIFA. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
16. Matteo, Renato. ""Federale 102". 1934 Italia World Cup Ball" (in Spanish). balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
17. ""Allen". 1938 France World Cup Ball" (in Spanish and English). balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
18. ""Super Duplo T". 1950 Brazil World Cup Official Matchball" (in Spanish and English). balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
19. "1954 Switzerland World Cup Official Matchball" (in Spanish and English). balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
20. Norlin, Arne (2008). "Bollen "Made in Sweden"". 1958: När Folkhemmet Fick Fotbolls-VM (in Swedish). Malmo: Ross & Tegner. pp. 130–6. ISBN 978-91-976144-8-1.
21. "Top Star 1958" (in Spanish and English). balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
22. Matteo, Renato (11 June 2010). ""Crack". 1962 Chile World Cup Official Matchball". balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
23. Matteo, Renato (11 June 2010). ""Slazenger Challenge 4-star". 1966 England World Cup Official Matchball". balones-oficiales.com. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
24. Brown balls are visible in Getty Images photos of matches in the Estadio Nou Camp, [[León, Guanajuato|]]:
    • #80752641 (West Germany v. England)
    • #79662284 (Bulgaria v. Morocco)
    • #81345734 (Peru v. West Germany)
    • #80752534 (Peru v. Morocco)
25. football World – Adidas Questra (Accessed 9 June 2006)
26. "69 days to go" (Press release). FIFA. 29 March 2015. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
27. "The adidas JO'BULANI – Official Match Ball for the final of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa". FIFA. Retrieved 17 September 2011.
28. "adidas Brazuca – Name of Official Match Ball decided by Brazilian fans". FIFA. Retrieved 2012-09-03.
29. "adidas unveils Official Match Ball for the Final of the FIFA Women's World Cup 2015" (Press release). FIFA. 7 June 2015. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
30. football World – European Football Championship balls(Accessed 9 June 2006)
31. "A Few Good Balls – "Adidas Gamarada 2000 Sydney Olympics"". Retrieved 13 September 2012.
32. "AFGB: 2008 Olympics". Retrieved 13 September 2012.
33. "Miscellaneous Symbols Range: 2600–26FF" (PDF). Unicode Consortium. 2009. Retrieved 2010-03-14.
34. Pentzlin, Karl (2 April 2008). "Proposal to encode a SOCCER BALL symbol in Unicode" (PDF). Retrieved 2010-03-14.

External links

• New York Times interactive feature on the evolution of the world cup ball
• van Rheenen, Erik (16 August 2013). "Why Are Soccer Balls Made of Hexagons?". Mental Floss. Retrieved 16 August 2013.