A sport that could bypass football: forgotten competitors of the main game of our time

According to the bookmaker Olympbet Kzalmost half of all online bets are on football matches. In addition, hockey and basketball occupy a significant market share. However, world sport was not always like this — at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, the same football had to compete with other sports, which are now exclusively niche entertainment. We tell you which disciplines could have replaced football, hockey and basketball if history had turned out a little differently.

Bendy: a large-scale game that loses to compactness

Bandy, also known as bandy, was one of the most popular winter sports in Europe and Russia at the beginning of the 20th century. The matches took place on huge ice fields, comparable in size to football fields, and the rules were in many ways reminiscent of football itself — with passes, positional struggle and tactical structure. In a number of countries, bandy attracted tens of thousands of spectators and was perceived as a more “intellectual” alternative to young ice hockey.

However, with the development of indoor arenas and television, the advantage turned out to be on the side of a more compact format. Ice hockey required less space, fit better on television, and became a commercial success faster. Bandy survived as a regional sport, but lost its chance for global dominance.

Football according to rugby rules: when the game was not yet unified

In the middle of the 19th century, football did not actually exist as a single sport. Different schools and towns in England played by their own rules, many of which allowed for handball, power tackles and hard contact. These formats gradually took shape in rugby, which for a long time competed with “association” football for the status of the main game.

Standardization was the decisive factor. Football turned out to be easier to understand, required less physical preparation and was more easily adaptable to mass competition. Rugby has remained popular in individual countries, but the high contact and complexity of the rules has limited its global spread compared to football.

Jai-alai: entertainment without becoming a mass phenomenon

Jai alai is often confused with pelota, and this is not a mistake: formally, jai alai is a type of Basque pelota. The difference is that players use a special curved basket to catch and throw the ball, and the flight speed can exceed that of most team sports. In the first half of the 20th century, jai alai was extremely popular in Spain and the United States, filling arenas and attracting public attention.

However, the complexity of the rules and the high risk of injury, plus an unexpectedly close connection with the mafia, have made the sport difficult to scale. It remained entertaining but niche entertainment, unable to compete with more universal and understandable games.

Message A sport that could bypass football: forgotten competitors of the main game of our time appeared first on Crimea news | CrimeaPRESS: latest news and main events.