The X-League is a professional American football

American football

American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...

 league in Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

. It was founded in 1971 as the Japan American Football League. It changed its name to the X-league in 1997. There are four divisions (X1, X2, X3, and X4) between which there is promotion and relegation

Promotion and relegation

In many sports leagues around the world, promotion and relegation is a process that takes place at the end of each season. Through it, teams are transferred between divisions based on their performance that season...

. Teams in the four-tier league are split into east, west, and central divisions. There are two types of teams, one being a company-team which only employees of that particular sponsoring company may participate as a player, and the other classified as a club-team for which anyone can try out.

The Japanese game is shorter, with quarters lasting 12 minutes instead of the standard 15 with some exceptions.