Difference Between Cricket and Football (And Some Similarities!)

Written by Shrot Katewain All Posts,History,Queries,Rules

While playing or watching various sports, it is natural for one to register differences or similarities among them. Some similarities and differences are subtle, while some are more prominent and the key distinguishers between the sports. Have you ever wondered if there are any similarities between cricket and football? Or what are the key factors that fundamentally separate football from cricket?

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Cricket and Football are both field games and team sports, and both consist of 11 players-a-side. However, key differences between Cricket and Football include the field’s shape and size, ball size and hardness, type of protective gear used, and the lack of a goalpost in cricket and stumps in Football.

While you must be knowing the basics of both the games, the following article presents quite a few key differences between football and cricket while highlighting some similarities as well!

The Differences between Cricket and Football

To begin with, let’s first look at the major differences between Football and Cricket.

1. Popularity, Playing Countries, and Viewership

Football, also known as Soccer (mainly in America) or Association Football, is the most popular game going by the viewerships across the world. FIFA World Cup, the most prominent football tournament was followed by 3.5 billion fans in the year 2018. Almost all countries play football.

Cricket, the second most followed game has a vast global reach as well, but international cricket matches are played among a handful of countries.

At present, there are only 12 teams who have got the affiliation to play Test matches, while 20 countries play One-Day International matches. Though, the Twenty-20 format is gaining popularity and global reach,  as 85 countries play Twenty-20 games.

Cricket has approximately 2.5 billion fans. The Cricket World Cup last played in 2019 was watched by about 2.6 billion people.

Rank	Sport	Estimated Fans	Popularity by Regions
1.	Association Football (Soccer)	3.5 Billion	Africa, America, Asia, Europe.
2.	Cricket	2.5 Billion	Asia, Australia, Europe
3	Basketball	2.2 Billion	Africa, America, Australia, Japan.
4.	Hockey	2 Billion	America, Asia, Australia, Europe.
5.	Tennis	1.2 Billion	America, Asia, Europe.
6.	Volleyball	900 Million	America, Asia, Australia, Europe.
7.	Table Tennis	850 Million	Africa, America, Asia, Europe.
8.	Baseball	500 Million	America, Japan.
=9	Rugby	400 Million	Africa, America, Asia, Australia, Europe
=9	American Football	400 Million	America

Most popular sports globally: Table credit

2. Ground Shape and Size