Table Football

Fuzboll

Table football (Bonzini style table)
Highest governing body	International Table Soccer Federation
Nicknames	Table soccer, foosball, kicker
Invented	1921
Characteristics
Contact	No
Team members	Single opponents, doubles, or teams of up to 4
Mixed gender	Yes
Type	Table
Equipment	Football table
Presence
Olympic	Yes

Table football, commonly called fuzboll or foosball (as in the German Fußball "football") and sometimes table soccer, is a table-top game that is loosely based on association football.

Although patents for similar games may exist from as far back as the 1890s, the game of table football as we know it today was first invented by Harold Searles Thornton in 1922 and patented in 1923 (UK patent no. 205,991 application dated 14 October 1922 and accepted 1 November 1923).

The concept was conceived after Harold had been to a Tottenham Hotspur F.C. football match (he was an avid supporter). He wanted to provide a game that replicated football that could be played at home. The inspiration came from a box of matches: by laying the matches across the box he had formed the basis of his game.

His uncle (United States resident Louis P. Thornton, who once lived in Portland, Oregon) visited Harold and took the inspiration back to the USA where it was patented in 1927 (United States Patent Office No. 1,615,491). However, he didn't see a lot of success with the game and let his patent expire. It wasn't until decades later that the game took off in the USA.

Meanwhile in Europe, the first leagues started springing up in the 1950s, and the European Table Soccer Union was formed in 1976. American soldier Lawrence Patterson re-introduced the game in the USA after playing in while stationed in Germany in the 1960s. He brought the first Bavarian-made table to the USA in 1962. Upon doing so, he trademarked the term "foosball" in both the USA and Canada, and gave his table the name "Foosball Match." In 1970, Hayes and Furr created the first America-made foosball table, and shortly thereafter the game became a national phenomenon that lasted until video games became popular in the 1980s.

In 2002, the International Table Soccer Federation (ITSF) was established in France with the mission of promoting the sport of Table Soccer as an organizing sports body, regulating international competitions, and establishing the game with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and General Association of International Sport Federation (GAISF). The U.S. joined ITSF in 2003.

To begin the game, the ball is served through a hole at the side of the table, or simply placed by hand at the feet of a figure in the centre of the table. The initial serving side is decided with a coin toss. Players attempt to use figures mounted on rotating bars to kick the ball into the opposing goal. Expert players have been known to move balls at speeds up to 56 km/h (35 mph) in competition.