Can any aspect of football be defined as ritual in the cultural or religious sense?

Question

Can any aspect of football be defined as ritual in the cultural or religious sense?

Answer 1

yes, the  whole game is a ritual,  the team huddle is a ritual, the plan is a ritual, the chase after the ball is symbolic of the Holy Grail  something treasured and fought over by  2 teams.  It is a ritual to symbolize war and bloodshed in a way that satisfies basic urges .

Answer 2

Is there any part that can't?

The uniforms accentuate the masculinity of the players to a ridiculous degree, the game is a metaphor for war, and have you been tailgating?

Answer 3

I have degrees in Anthropology and Religion and can say with certainty that, yes, football displays ritual acts in the cultural sense and in the religious sense as well (will get to this).  Football is full of culture, whether you mean European of American does not matter.  It is a game that brings large numbers of people together in one place.  It has rules that must be followed and penalties for these rules.  There are certain foods and drinks associated with the game.  You do not dress the same for a football game as you would for work or going out to eat lunch.  You act differently, use different words and speech patterns, everything is cultural.  

Football for many is much like church.  You go to your buddies house every Monday night (Church on Sunday), meet with the same group of guys (congregation), drink beer (wine), eat chips (bread) and pray for effects which are out of your control.

One of the hardest exercises is to try and define religion.  This task is almost impossible to do without excluding something you wish to include (i.e. mentioning God or gods leaves out Buddhism, Taoism, etc.) or including things you do not wish (i.e. simply a system of rules built on a shared belief system includes golf [ or football ] ).

Short answer:  Yes, all aspects of football can be defined as ritual in the religio-cultural sense.

Answer 4

no WHAT THE h**l