Only a name?

A friend tells me that he was at a sports function the other night when a minor war of words erupted over someone using the term ‘soccer’.

A football man — that is to say, a soccer man — took exception to what he seemed to consider a derogatory name for the world’s most popular sport.

He is not alone. Only recently, a columnist in a national newspaper revealed his revulsion at the use of the word while, over the years, I’ve lost track of the number of times the subject has been the occasion of heated and, invariably, drink-fuelled debate.