Sun, oh sun!
It is worth knowing that ball games, although practised everywhere, are sun cult symbols. The ball represents the sphere of life and the fertility that it is necessary for one to conquer and acquire. Around the ball that is the sun, this sacred and supreme centre of the world … an invisible cosmogony, a ritual battle, takes place. All the ancient ball games, whether using an object made of leather, bamboo, tissue or rubber, have a strong symbolic significance, linked to the sun cult, by association with the globe that moves in the sky, the kingdom of the gods.
Philippe Villemus, Le Dieu football (The Football God) (Ed. Eyrolles 2006)
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