--- title: Why Singing Is One of Sports' Most Enduring Rituals description: Whether their team is winning or losing, people have an odd tendency to sing. Psychologists explain why. canonical: https://time.com/article/2026/07/15/why-sports-fans-break-out-into-song-world-cup/ author: Veronique Greenwood article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2026-07-15T15:04:57.897Z article:modified_time: 2026-07-15T15:04:58.185Z article:section: Health og:title: The Reason Why Sports Fans Break Out into Song og:description: Whether their team is winning or losing, people have an odd tendency to sing. Psychologists explain why. og:url: https://time.com/article/2026/07/15/why-sports-fans-break-out-into-song-world-cup/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d39ad22f46380d9/6a579d5025e8785b15d9f927/GettyImages-662973202.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: GettyImages-662973202.jpg og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Reason Why Sports Fans Break Out into Song twitter:description: Whether their team is winning or losing, people have an odd tendency to sing. Psychologists explain why. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d39ad22f46380d9/6a579d5025e8785b15d9f927/GettyImages-662973202.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Why Singing Is One of Sports' Most Enduring Rituals > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. by [Veronique Greenwood](https://time.com/author/veronique-greenwood/) ## Veronique Greenwood Jul 15, 2026 3:04 PM UTC  Footballs fans in Munich, Germany, sing during a match in 2017. Footballs fans in Munich, Germany, sing during a match in 2017. Adam Pretty/Bongarts—Getty Images by [Veronique Greenwood](https://time.com/author/veronique-greenwood/) ## Veronique Greenwood Jul 15, 2026 3:04 PM UTC Last Saturday night, on July 11, trains into Leeds, [England](https://time.com/tag/united-kingdom/), where I live, were canceled because of an electrical issue. The only way for me to get back home—or, in the case of most of my fellow passengers, to get to the big pub screens showing the England-Norway [World Cup](https://time.com/tag/world-cup/) match—was to take the local double-decker bus. I was in the company of about two dozen teenage boys, many shirtless in the heat, drink cans locked in their fists, in a state of high excitement, and in possession of a battered boom box. First, the muted strains of "[Three Lions](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJqimlFcJsM)," the English football anthem exploring the great disappointment of being an English football fan in recent decades, began to mix with the muttering and chatter of the bus. Then as the music swelled towards the chorus, a wall of eager voices rose above the rest of the noise: "Football's coming home, it's coming home!" The sound was raucous, atonal, yet weirdly joyful, and as the bus swung round the curves past blackened stone cottages and fields freshly hayed, a middle-aged man in the front of the bus turned around, and, hanging onto the back of his seat, started to sing along. An older couple put up their hands and began to sway. "No more years of hurt, no more need for dreaming!" A man with a cane coming up the stairs raised it triumphantly. He staggered into the aisle and held onto the seatbacks, belting out the lyrics as the bus pulled back into the road. The setting sun was pouring red through the clouds as a pair of children scampered into seats at the back and then jumped when the whole bus roared, "Three lions on a shirt!" ## Why do sports fans sing? It’s not just England, and it’s not just football. Group singing is an important tradition surrounding big events for many sports around the world. When crowds of people sing in unison in a stadium or arena—[when fans of Turkish basketball sing “12 Giant Men,”](https://www.espn.com/blog/truehoop/post/%5F/id/19707/turks-delight-singing-home-crowd-by-beating-france) for example, or [cricket fans belt out “Mrs. Robinson”](https://www.bbc.co.uk/music/articles/787dd3da-e3fa-4fce-b141-b77552280a19)—it’s sometimes intended to pep up the players. Fans often [write new lyrics referencing individual players](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football%5Fchant) or make jokes about the opponents (or [about the singers themselves](https://research.abo.fi/ws/portalfiles/portal/27096819/Herd%5FL%5Ffgren%5F2020%5FMocking%5FOthers%5Fin%5FSwedish%5FFootball.pdf)). But fan singing serves another purpose, social scientists say. On a fundamental level, “music can turn a collection of individuals into a temporary social group,” says sports psychologist Andy Lane of University of Wolverhampton in the U.K. “The song effectively tells people: ‘We are experiencing this together.’” When people who have watched a televised game sing on the bus or [on the sidewalks of their neighborhoods](https://uk.news.yahoo.com/watch-crowds-swarm-town-centre-142848194.html)—despite being nowhere near the stadium—it’s a continuation of the same effect. “After an important win, the emotional intensity remains high, and singing allows supporters to express joy, affiliation, and shared meaning in public,” says Lane. “It can be both spontaneous emotional release and a signal of belonging.” Watch [rugby fans in the streets of Paris, singing after a match](https://www.reddit.com/r/rugbyunion/comments/1lnz86g/toulouse%5Fsupporters%5Fsinging%5Fdans%5Fles%5Fyeux%5Fdemilie/), and you can feel the energy. After wrapping up “Three Lions” on the bus, the crowd segued into [Oasis' "Wonderwall."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hzrDeceEKc) (Not every place might have been willing to roll with a loud singalong on public transit, rather than in a stadium: A Dutch graduate student visiting from Germany gazed about him in disbelief, marveling that this would never happen in Germany—that someone would have called the police.) ## Even non-fans can join in This type of public singing can spread beyond the initial group to people who are not even sports fans. After “Wonderwall,” the bus continued into “[Sweet Caroline,”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F%5FRCWVoL4s) the Neil Diamond hit from 1969 that has become [an unofficial English football anthem](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-57761227). A grandmotherly woman leaned across the aisle, smiled, and told people within earshot that she was singing along to “Sweet Caroline” when _she_ was a teenager. It’s that sense of universality that makes these moments endure. “Familiar songs such as ‘Three Lions,’ ‘Wonderwall,’ and ‘Sweet Caroline’ are culturally shared, so they can temporarily reduce the boundary between supporters and bystanders,” says Lane. “People begin by joining the song, but in doing so they also join the group.” Later that night, long after the bus had arrived at its destination, England won, advancing to the World Cup semifinals. On July 15, they will play Argentina. 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