Learn English Through Football: Byline Learn English Through Football

This learn English through football podcast explains the language of football: the words, phrases, and cliches used in the game.  This week, we look at the word ‘byline’, and how is it different from goal line. There is a transcript of the show below, which can be used by learners of English to practice listening and reading skills. It can also be used by teachers of English to create activities, such as fill in the blanks, true/false, comprehension questions, sentence ordering activities, etc. You can also check out our massive glossary of footballing phrases here. We have hundreds of previous posts and podcasts too on our website. All  can access these resources for free.  Let us know if you have any suggestions or questions then you can contact us at admin@languagecaster.com.

Learn English Through Football

DB: Hi there everyone. Welcome to languagecaster.com’s football language podcast. These podcast explain the words, phrases and cliches used in the beautiful game of football. My name’s Damon, and I’m based in Tokyo, while Damian, the other half of the team, is based in London. It’s international football at the moment and most domestic leagues are taking a break. I wonder if your watching any of the international matches where you are.

Over here, Japan took on North Korea, in an ASEAN World Cup qualifying second round match, beating them 1-0, and will play the return leg next week. Japan look favourites to qualify for the third round of qualifying, but nothing is taken for granted when playing their bitter rivals. Check out an excellent Guardian article for more on this rivalry.

Stinger: You are listening to languagecaster.com (in Polish)

DB: Yes, you are listening to languagecaster and that message was in Polish.

OK, on today’s podcast, I’m going to be looking at the word ‘byline‘, which is something we have talked about before, way back in 2017. Recently, we received a comment about this word, and I thought it would be worth talking about it again.

Byline

DB: Ok, well let’s start with what we mean by the byline. The football pitch is marked with white lines to help players, the referee and spectators better follow the game. So, for example, we have the penalty area, the six-yard box, the centre circle and of course the touchlines. The shorter lines that run at either end of the pitch are known as the bylines.

Often, attacking teams will try to take the ball to the byline, as it opens up spaces and also makes it easier to deliver dangerous crosses into the box.

Goal Line

Now, we had a comment this week from Colin, questioning our definition of byline. This is what he said: ‘There is no byline. Check law 1. It’s a goal line.‘

Now, Colin is right in saying that the IFAB Rules of the Game dealing with the field of play, or the pitch, state that ‘The two longer boundary lines are touchlines. The two shorter lines are goal lines.‘ They don’t say byline.

But there is a difference between the official, and formal, way of talking about the game, and the way people who watch and play the game speak about it. Take for example Law 1 itself. This is about the Field of Play, but most people call the ‘field of play’ the pitch.

In the same way, the goal line is the official way of talking about the shorter line at the...