When I was a 17 year old college freshman, we still had mandatory physical education. So I took “team sports” which was supposed to be baseball, basketball, etc. like back in high school.
However the instructor (professor) turned out to be an international soccer player, just back from Finland or some such place. We played only soccer the entire semester.
A few years later I was stationed in Germany, and saw it being played everywhere, so I watched. Still later one of the very first subscription television channels brought English Premier League play to us, in the mid-late 70s. They edited a game down to 60 minutes.
The commentary was done by Mario Machado, who brought the game to English speakers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Machado
I’ve come across two Frenchmen just off-the-street and seen them play in casual games; both of them were very skilled and that is from a country that is often looked at as being more of a Rugby nation. One was a typical mustachioed type from Tours, pear-shaped, the other was a young buck who actually could have passed for a German per his appearance. I’ve come across others from European nations as well who knew their stuff but these two in that were actually pretty amazing and clearly above average.