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Football (Soccer) vocabulary · Formations & Tactics

Line-up

Meaning in football (soccer), with examples

/ˈlaɪn ʌp/nounCore term

In football (soccer), line-up means: The list of players a team starts a match with, usually including their positions, published about an hour before kick-off.

In Turkish: ilk 11, maç kadrosu

How it is used

Also called the starting line-up, starting eleven or team sheet. Fans wait for the line-up to be announced, and managers rotate, change or name an unchanged line-up. A player can be in the line-up or dropped from it.

Example sentences

  1. The line-up is out: our captain is back after injury.

  2. He made four changes to the line-up for the cup tie.

Common collocations

  • starting line-up
  • unchanged line-up
  • name the line-up
  • the line-up is announced
  • formationThe way a team arranges its outfield players on the pitch, written as numbers from defence to attack, such as 4-4-2 or 4-3-3.
  • squadAll the players available to a team for a season or a competition, from whom the starting eleven and the substitutes are chosen.
  • substituteA player who starts the match on the bench and can come on to replace a teammate during the game.
  • captainThe player chosen to lead the team on the pitch, who wears the armband, takes part in the coin toss and is the referee's main contact.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Formations & Tactics

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