foul play

American  

noun

1. any treacherous or unfair dealing, especially involving murder.

   We feared that he had met with foul play.

2. unfair conduct in a game.

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foul play British  

noun

1. unfair or treacherous conduct esp with violence

2. a violation of the rules in a game or sport

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foul play Idioms  

1. Unfair or treacherous action, especially involving violence. For example, The police suspected he had met with foul play. This term originally was and still is applied to unfair conduct in a sport or game and was being used figuratively by the late 1500s. Shakespeare used it in The Tempest (1:2): “What foul play had we, that we came from thence?”

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Etymology

Origin of foul play

First recorded in 1600–10

Example Sentences

Jeremy, Bath: By that logic, virtually every single handball should be deemed no foul play as accidental!

From BBC • May 17, 2026

The Sierra Madre Police Department said Saturday that a man — at that point unidentified — died after having a medical emergency on the trail and that no foul play was suspected.

From Los Angeles Times • May 11, 2026

“But obviously the pattern of foul play continues,” Bouchouev said in an email to MarketWatch.

From MarketWatch • May 6, 2026

Would the VAR have stepped in to show a red card to Digne for serious foul play with his late challenge on Jacob Murphy?

From BBC • Feb. 14, 2026

They were running, all four of them, Cari shrieking foul play even though she’d pulled the same trick herself a hundred times.

From "Out of Darkness" by Ashley Hope Pérez