Unless you’ve been living under a rock recently, you know that the biggest event in world sports is going on right now – the World Cup (世界杯 – shì jiè bēi). In America, we call it soccer, but the rest of the world knows this sport as football (足球 – zú qiú). In case you were wondering, in Chinese, the kind of football that’s popular in the USA is actually called “American style rugby” (美式橄榄球 – měi shì gǎn lǎn qiú). This year, the World Cup is going on in one of the biggest countries in the world for football – Brazil (巴西 – bā xī). Although the Chinese team did not make the cut (again), football is still wildly popular in China, and World Cup matches will be watched all over the country. This great article from Time talks about the woes of Chinese football, in case you’re interested.
The Chinese team takes a beating from the Thai team, as mentioned in the Time article.
Photo by Maggio7 from www.flickr.com
To help you talk about this huge event with your Chinese colleagues or friends, here are 25 useful vocabulary words for talking about soccer/football in Chinese:
球场 – qiú chǎng
pitch/field
球员 – qiú yuán
player
教练 – jiào liàn
coach
前场 – qián chǎng
front field
中场 – zhōng chǎng
midfield
后场 – hòu chǎng
backfield
守门员 – shǒu mén yuán
goalkeeper
救球 – jiù qiú
save
队长 – duì zhǎng
captain
开球 – kāi qiú
kick-off
点球 – diǎn qiú
penalty kick
角球 – jiǎo qiú
corner kick
任意球 – rèn yì qiú
free kick
带球 – dài qiú
dribbling
传球 – chuán qiú
passing
射门 – shè mén
shooting
头球 – tóu qiú
header
掷界外球 – zhí jiè wài qiú
throw-in
铲球 – chǎn qiú
tackle
裁判 – cái pàn
referee
黄牌 – huáng pái
yellow card
红牌 – hóng pái
red card
半场 – bàn chǎng
half time
全场 – quán chǎng
full time
足球鞋 – zú qiú xié
cleats
For more Chinese practice talking about football, check out this recent episode of ChinesePod, which is all about the World Cup in Brazil.
Sasha is an English teacher, writer, photographer, and videographer from the great state of Michigan. Upon graduating from Michigan State University, he moved to China and spent 5+ years living, working, studying, and traveling there. He also studied Indonesian Language & Culture in Bali for a year. He and his wife run the travel blog Grateful Gypsies, and they're currently trying the digital nomad lifestyle across Latin America.
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