A colleague of mine said there is no such thing as "playing snowball" in English.
In my native language, when we talk about "snowball", we use it with the verb "play." I wonder "playing snowball sounds" like a natural use of language in English? I looked it up in a few dictionaries and I couldn't find an example with play.
However, when I looked it up on Ludwig, I found out about two sentences.
Another 10-year-old, Ashvini, kept warm by playing snowballs with his dad, Dheeraj Kulshrestha, after possibly the longest journey of everyone. They were stopping off in London en route from Ohio to India and decided to make the pilgrimage to Stonehenge for the solstice. --Steven Morris- Guardian
"But I have always liked Charles - I've always had a soft spot for him. I used to watch Charles and Anne playing snowballs as children at Sandringham, they had little blue coats on. Yes, I go back a long way." By Zoe Applegate & Martin BarberBBC News, Norfolk
So, can I use "playing snowball" or not? Do I have to say "have a snowball fight?" or "throw snowballs" ?
Just to make it clear, do all of the following sentences sound OK and can they be used interchangeably?
- Children were throwing snowballs on the street.
- Children were having a snowball fight on the street.
- Children were playing snowball on the street.