As some of us might (or might not; my Jill ass may be the nearest thing
to a jock in here), football season--no matter which set of laws you
might subscribe to--is near the middle of its run (and I've been
thinking about this since at *least* the beginning of the season).

Then the now-familiar crowing about how "the UK have embraced the
American game!" -- "no they haven't; if they had there'd be a gridiron
field in every village greater than 1000 population" started ensuing
about a month after that.

It got me to thinking: all of the people who founded most of these games
were of similar genetic stock, and the ancestral game of all of them was
the town ball game.

Is there any way that gridiron ball instead originates in the UK? In
particular, I'd think that the possible cause would be that the first
reform to make townball less-deadly might be the imposition of--in some
order--a set number of players, and the down-and-distance system. Then
eventually, just as happened in most every modern football code, the
field would get shrunk and it would become possible to score repeatedly
in order to get beyond that.

Bonus points if you can come up with a way that North America instead
embraces the association game, possibly by it being an *American* who
first commits the etymological fallacy that "the game is called football
not because it's played ON foot, but because it's supposed to only be
played WITH the foot".

I don't really have a suggestion for myself, but if at all possible I
*would* prefer that the absolute first PoD be footy related rather than
it being a knock-on effect from, say, the colonial revolution failing?

--
Chrysi Cat
1/2 anthrocat, nearly 1/2 anthrofox, all magical
Transgoddess, quick to anger
Call me Chrysi or call me Kat, I'll respond to either!