The term ‘our national sport’ has been bandied around a fair bit in the Australian media and also the international media in the past fortnight, but what is a national sport?
Does giving a sport a name that includes the nation in which the sport is played make it the National sport? Examples of this would be American Football or Australian Rules Football.
Interestingly despite the sport being known as American Football for decades those running the game found that such a name held it back when they looked to expand their reach overseas, and so Gridiron is the name that they have been trying to promote.
If a national sport is not based on its name, is a national sport the one that has the highest participation numbers? Surely this would be the most logical way of judging such a claim, as if the most people in that nation are playing that sport, it would appear that the sport has every right to claim to be the people’s sport. Or certainly the most popular sport in that nation.
Then of course there is the sport that the nation is automatically linked with by those looking in on it. Outsiders may perceive a sport to be the national sport of a country while the inhabitants of that nation see their national sport as being a very different activity.
So how can a sport claim to be the national sport? Who decides such things? On what basis is this statement made?
It is interesting to learn that in some countries the answer is extremely clear. For in some countries the national sport has been declared by law.
For example Pato, a cross between polo and basketball on horseback has been declared the national sport of Argentina. Rodeo has been declared the national sport of Chile. In the Phillipines it is the martial art of Arnis that has been declared by law to be the national sport. In Canada they have two such sports, in the Summer it is Lacrosse and in the winter it should come as no surprise that they have Ice Hockey as a national sport.
If we look at the United Kingdom, and we asked many who live there what their national sport is they would reply that it was football. In case you have been under a rock you may have heard them convinced that the home of football is England and whatever International tournament they play in that trophy is ‘coming home.’
Yet despite this view in the UK the view outside of there is that the national sport is still cricket. This sport is seen as still being essentially English, and even though the phrase ‘it’s just not cricket’ has lost a great deal of its past meaning, and the sport no longer has the reputation for honourable and gentlemanly behaviour, to the outside world Cricket is the sport that they link to that nation.
What is also interesting about this perception is that according to research company Statista the most viewed match on television in 2020 was the Six Nations Championship rugby match between England and Wales with 7.6million viewers tuning in. By comparison the 2020 UEFA Champions League final had viewing figures of 2.8million; although to be fair there were no English teams playing in that final.
Football however was ranked one the highest participation sports in the UK with 1,385,700 participants. This is discounting running which came first, fitness classes, weight training, and exercise machines. Swimming was the top ranked sport with 2, 355,300 participants, yet few would say that this was the national sport.
In the United States despite American Football/Gridiron perceived to be the national sport the most common view outside of the USA is that Baseball is their national sport; even thought this writer plumped for basketball.
Based on revenue, the five major professional sports leagues in order of revenue in the United States are Major League Baseball (MLB), the National Basketball Association (NBA), the National Football League (NFL), Major League Soccer (MLS) and the National Hockey League (NHL).
There is a slight change in the order of these when it comes to watching sport. American football is the most popular spectator sport to watch, followed by baseball, basketball, ice hockey and soccer/football.
Again based on statistics produced by Statista Swimming was the highest participation sport in the USA, with Basketball in second place. Soccer/Football came in sixth, baseball eighth, and American football 14th.
Maybe due to baseball being the biggest revenue earner and again not a sport with a high profile around the world, that is why it is viewed as being the USA’s national sport.
Looking at Australia, it will be rammed down your throat that Australian Rules football is the national sport. While many media outlets believe this a large section of the public will not endorse such a view. Once again the view from outside of Australia is very different to perception inside the country as Cricket is listed as being the national sport.
In Australia Swimming came out top, apart from walking and gym users, as the number one participation sport. Hot on its heels came cycling and then football/soccer. Australian Rules football came in 12th and Cricket 14th. Netball which is traditionally a female-only sport did remarkably well to come in 13th.
Apart from receiving the most media coverage the AFL also attracts the most sponsorship revenue – how much is this due to that media coverage? – and the highest average attendance figures. However this has to be tempered with the fact that the competition has 18 teams who all play 22 games before a finals series. Comparison with the National Rugby League which has the second highest sponsorship and average attendance is fair as they have 16 teams who each play 24 games. Super Rugby comes in next followed by the Big Bash League in Cricket where there are only 8 teams and they play only 14 games each. In the A-League there are 12 teams playing 26 matches each. So spectator figures can be distorted by the fact that one competition is in fact playing more or less matches.
Trawling through all of these statistics and figures one is none the wiser as to what gives a sport the right to be called a national sport. The logical view would be that the sport with the most participants should be afforded that honour, just as British Airways was allowed to call itself the World’s Favourite airline due to the fact that it carried the most passengers.
While that may sound reasonable it is interesting that the perception outside of so many nations is very different to the actual facts, or that nation’s own view of itself. Ask any Indian what their national sport is and nine out of ten will tell you that it is cricket. Yet statistics still show that the world views Hockey as still being their national sport, even though the bronze medal their men won in Tokyo was their first Olympic medal in 41 years.
This maybe proves that tradition and history are long-lasting, and that no matter how much you may try and tell people something those traditional views are hard to break.
Possibly the best explanation as to what determines a national sport is that “it is a sport that is considered to be an intrinsic part of the culture of a nation.” Meaning that it may not be the most played, or the most watched, or be the sport that brings in the most revenue or receives the most media coverage, but they are the sports that are ‘important historically and culturally significant’ to that country.
Which takes us back to square one, who is the judge of this? Is it those within the nation or those outside of it? Also have these views shifted over time in line with immigration numbers to a country which may see a shift in those traditional cultures?
It looks as if the claims will continue to be made but no one can give a definitive answer as to what is a national sport.
