Footy, cricket and sport talk: an Aussie sport phrase guide for newcomers

Which footy? It depends on your state

Footy is football, shortened the Aussie way. In one study of Australian shortened words it was the single most common -ie form, ahead of bickie and brekkie. The catch is which football. Australia has four codes, and the word follows whichever one is biggest where you are standing. The Aussie versus American page already says ask which footy. This is why.

The four codes in one line each

Aussie Rules: the ball is moved by running, kicking and handballing. A mark is a clean catch of a kick that has travelled at least 15 metres, and that mark earns a free kick. A foul earns a free kick too. The AFL is the national competition.

Rugby league: the winter game of NSW and Queensland, where the score that matters is a try, and the NRL is the competition.

Rugby union: the other rugby. Say rugby on its own here and most people will assume you mean union.

Soccer: soccer to most people, and football to the people who play it.

The Barassi Line

You will hear people talk about the Barassi Line, an imaginary line across the country with Aussie Rules on one side and rugby on the other. It is named after a famous Aussie Rules figure and it is a way of talking, not a border. It is approximate, and near the line you will find both. If you are anywhere near it, ask.

Cheeky code nicknames

Each code has a name the others call it, and they are teasing, not neutral. Aerial ping-pong is Aussie Rules, for all the long high kicks. The Australian National Dictionary Centre has it from the 1940s, calls it jocular and frequently derisive, and says it is mostly used by people from rugby league states. Macquarie's footy blog adds catch and kiss for soccer, mungo ball for rugby league and thugby for rugby union. Use them with a grin, and only once you know which side of the room you are on.

Supporting a team: who do you barrack for?

To barrack for a team is to support it, usually loudly. Who do you barrack for? is the question you will get in your first week, and it is a friendly one.

Here is the trap for British speakers. On its own, barrack means to jeer, and it still does in Britain. Australian English flipped it: barrack for has meant cheering since the 1880s. The ANDC's best guess on the origin is a Northern Irish word barrack meaning to brag, though some claim it comes from the old phrase poke borak, to deride.

Say it: "Who do you barrack for?" "Still deciding. Who should I?"

Footy gods and chewie on your boot

Two you will hear from the couch. The footy gods, in Macquarie's words, are the notional gods thought to intervene to restore fairness in a football game after a bad umpiring decision. When the other side gets a lucky bounce two minutes later, that is them.

Have you got a chewie on your boot? is yelled from the stands at a player lining up a kick, to put them off. Chewie is chewing gum. Nobody expects an answer.

Footy words that escaped the ground

Some footy words now get used about work, politics and the weather.

Screamer

In Aussie Rules a screamer is a spectacular high mark: a player leaps, often over someone else, and cleanly catches the kicked ball. The ANDC has it from 1953. A mark has to travel at least 15 metres without bouncing, and it earns a free kick. A screamer is the show-off version. Off the field, anything spectacular can be a screamer.

Get a guernsey

A guernsey is a football jumper, especially in Aussie Rules, and has been since the 1860s. To get a guernsey first meant to be picked for the team. Now it means to be picked for anything, or to get recognised. She finally got a guernsey on the project. That one is worth learning for work.

Boundary rider and meat pie

A boundary rider was a station worker who rode the fence line. Since the 1980s it has also been the boundary umpire in Aussie Rules, a fielder out near the rope in cricket, and the roving reporter at a game. In rhyming slang a meat pie is a try, the score in rugby. You will hear that one less these days, but it is in the ANDC, and you will eat a meat pie at the footy either way. When a team loses badly, someone will spit the dummy, and a full ground is chockers, which is in the dictionary.

Cricket talk for summer

Footy is winter. When the season ends, people fetch their cricket bats from the shed, and the radio changes sound. Cricket has a dictionary of its own. These are the words that leave the ground.

Howzat

Howzat is how's that?, shouted at the umpire by the bowler and fielders when they reckon the batter is out. It is an appeal, and it matters, because under the Laws of Cricket the umpire cannot give a batter out unless someone appeals. So the yelling is procedure, not rudeness.

Sledging

Sledging is a fielder trying to break a batter's concentration with abuse or needling. The ANDC traces it to sledgehammer, an unsubtle form of verbal abuse, and has it first recorded in cricket in the mid-1970s. Since then it has escaped: politicians get sledged, so do work rivals, and copping a sledging can mean any public ridicule.

Out for a duck, and a golden duck

Out for a duck is out without scoring a run. The name comes from a duck's egg, the shape of the zero in the scorebook. A golden duck is out on the first ball you face. A pair is a duck in both innings of a match. A king pair is a golden duck in both, which is as bad as it gets.

Off the field, a duck is any total blank. Three job applications this week and a duck.

Jaffa, maiden, hat-trick and carry the bat

Jaffa: an excellent, near unplayable ball from the bowler. Also a lolly here, which helps you remember it.

Maiden: an over, the bowler's set of six balls, with no runs scored off it.

Hat-trick: three wickets from three balls in a row. Cricket had the word first, and every other sport borrowed it.

Carry the bat: an opening batter who is still not out when the rest of the team is all out.

Wicket: the three stumps and two bails the bowler is aiming at, and also a dismissal. They have lost three wickets means three batters are out.

Sport words you will hear this week

Next time someone asks who you barrack for, you will have an answer. Chat with Bruce.

How to join in, even if you do not follow sport

These are the Aussie Talk team's suggestions, not research.

1. Ask who do you barrack for? It is the easiest opener in the country.
2. If you do not follow a code, say so. I am still working out which footy is which gets a laugh, not a frown.
3. Learn one phrase from each group above. Barrack for, screamer, howzat and out for a duck will get you through most Mondays.
4. Do not pick sides in a code war on your first day. Enjoy it from the fence.
5. After the game it is someone's shout, and the rules for that are on the backpacker slang page.

Next: Aussie English versus American English, including which football.

Questions about Aussie sport talk