MARGINAL COMMENTS
By E. L. WOODWARD
MBE: winter sports of the urban poor as well as the sports of the urbanised rich have begun again. I-find the sport; of the poor more civilised and- more amusing. There is no banging away at birds on exquisite wing, that the whirr of ,feathers may be silenced, the flight broken, and life tumbled -into death.- There is - no harrying of frightened cubs. Footballers are not -carried a-bout in boxes, to be chivvied round the country. They are not dug out of their hiding places ; they are not driven into the sea. Moreover, professional football' doeS' not seem to have that awful effect pxocdided • by So-Called blood sports upon the .eYeS, faces, and voices of the females who have anything to do with them. An interest in this football. will not -merely take. you through the winter. - It will give-you •the promise. of spring. - The teeth of winter are drawn when the qualifying 'rounds are over, and -the cup-ties begin in full earnest. The semi- finals come before -the daffodils, and the cheer's of- the grand finale fade into the first note Of 'the dicks:it); to will enrich your life, if you will apply yourself to the fortunes of football teams. Those twin Dioscuri; the Sunday papers which I may , not name, will take a new meaning for you. As February moves towards March, and the struggle for points and promotion becomes more desperate, you will find yourself coming down earlier on Sunday mornings. - You will not spoil your pleasure by reading a football final on Saturday night. You will wait for the Sabbath calm.
I have noticed that in most fornis of athletics (I exclude rowing) the qualities which make up sportsman- ship are found more often in the onlookers than in the participants. You can learn. a good deal about the Team Spirit from supporting Tottenham Hotspur whom you have never seen. You will know how to take a licking like a man when the Spurs are beaten by West Ham United. You will enjoy triumph without vainglory when Brentford rise higher and higher in the • scale. YOU clench your fists Iike an Englishrhan in a tight corner when your favourite club sinks from Division I to Division II. You merge your personality in a wider whole when you know that no member of the Chelsea team was born in Chelsea, and that no Arsenal player has evcr seen Woolwich Common. After all, the Great Bear is not a bear, and the Virgin and Scales exist only in your own imagination. God alone knows what they really are.
For all your patriotism, you will have no' sectional interests. You will not complain if Jack Smith; -without: whom the forwards of Aston Villa are as leaves L;efore the wind, ghosts as from, an enchanter , fleeing, you will not complain if Jack Smith is called away to play for England, and the Villa are. beaten by a gigantic tale of goals. Then there is Steve Macdermot. You know, and the world of men knows, . all about Steve Macdermot., You know that Steve was discovered,. =a,-,.few years back, kicking a battered football- with:, divine skill -against a railway bridge, a bleak bridge sornewhere near Oldham. You know to the last shilling hOW much a certain initnager paid for him. You know that this manager was' fool enough _to give him up, tempted by a dazzling offer.. Yon,knoyv, what happened,.atter thiS transfer, to Ste4re'S Old side. Steve's portrait.is now on hundreds of cigarette cards. You may get one of them out of a slot machine. What aplomb, what wise beneficence you will show when you say to the-small boy who has been eyeing you, the slot machine, the- packet of cigarettes, and. the card ; "Here, my lad; -here. is Steve Macdermot.": • And ' all this' excitement, all these thoughts, all this magnifieefidel they are all yours,-'every Sunday morning at your Breakfast table.
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