Single (football)

A single (single point, rouge or UNO), in Canadian football, is awarded when the ball is kicked into the end zone by any legal means, other than a successful field goal, and the receiving team does not return, or kick, the ball out of its end zone. It is also a single if the kick travels through the end zone or goes out of bounds in the end zone without being touched, except on a kickoff. After conceding a single, the receiving team is awarded possession of the ball at the 35-yard line.

Singles are not awarded if a ball is downed in the end zone after being intercepted in the end zone, or fumbled outside the end zone, or if the kick hits the goalposts, or when a kickoff goes into the end zone and then out of bounds without being touched. In all these cases the defending team is awarded possession of the ball at the 25-yard line.

In the USA, singles are only awarded in matches played under the auspices of the American Indoor Football Association but with more restrictive rules. It is only applied on kickoffs; most commonly the single occurs when a kickoff is kicked through the uprights (where it is frequently called a UNO). It can also be scored if the receiving team fails to advance the ball out of the end zone when kicked, according to the official rule book.

The Canadian Football League has discussed abolishing the single but proposals to do so as recently as 2005 have been rejected.

In the official rules, the single point is also called a "rouge", French for "red", and the origin is unclear. One theory is that it originated at a time when the point was subtracted from the defending team's score (occasionally giving a team negative points, putting them in the red).Fact|date=February 2007; another is that a red flag was used to signal the score in the game's early days.

However, the concept of the 'rouge' dates back to several public school sports played in England from the early 19th century. In field hockey played at Rossall School, and the Field Game at Eton, both of which are still played today, a 'rouge' can be scored after the ball has gone into the local equivalent of the 'endzone' after striking another player. The Sheffield Rules, a 19th-century code of football, also utilized the rouge as a secondary scoring method. The behind is a similar concept used in Australian rules football, as is the over in Gaelic football.

See also

* Touchback
* Glossary of Canadian football