ASSOCIATION.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 129, 30 May 1908, Page 14

ASSOCIATION.

At the annual meeting of the Otago Football Association the president, Mr. S. S.- Myers—who has held the position since the association's inception, 18 years ago—said: "Last season was one of the most prosperous years since the game first commenced its upward career. Year by year, season by season, it has gained adherents, both players and patrons, until we can now begin to look to the time of its taking the same place in the football of this Dominion as it does in the Mother Country. The play needs improving. Our players do not play the high-class game as played in Britain. How is this? They can beat the rest of the Empire at the Rugby game, and why not at the Association? The men, physically and mentally, are as good as others; they practise and take a keen and lively interest in the game, but the fact remains that a selected team of the pick of New Zealand players will not beat a good second grade team at Home. The Auckland Association is suggesting that a team should be sent to the Old Country, and that the Home authorities should be asked to send -% team here. Could such a scheme eventuate the game would progress rapidly." There are two distinct classes of amateurs cays a London writer) —the one which sets up a high standard from ■which it must be said it seldom departs, and the one which is only amateur until it can qualify for professionalism. There are some of the former class which fall into the latter— I have in my mind more than one man at the present time who has deliberately thrown away the advantages of a public school and university education to embrace football professionalism; more's the pity. I am of the strong opinion that Tβferees make too free a use of the penalty kick (says Mr. W. Pickford in the "Athletic News"),. That law was never meant to apply to anything but intentional fouls of a specified kind; but it seems to mc that the fact that the act must be intended, or it is not an offence at all, is being overlooked. Whether it is following the line of least resistance on the part of referees to blow the whistle mechanically, and not consider, as in honour bound, the merits of the act under notice, I cannot say, but my idea is "that quite half of the penalty kicks awarded are for clumsy and accidental happenings, and not for wilful fouls at all. It may be easier to tar all with the same brush than to pick out the genuine cases and let the others go, but that is not the referee's duty. Nor is it just to the players. If there is little or no discrimination the player who is penalised for an accidental happening, and who feels that whether he means to foul or not does not seem to matter, soon becomes callous to the indignity of having a penalty kick given against him. I should feel ashamed of it myself. But frequent enforcing of the penalty when undeserved might soon destroy any man's sense of self respect. The English Association match which drew the world's record crowd at Glasgow last month was the League International, Scotland v. England. It is thus referred to by the "Sporting Life":— "What an extraordinary sight Hampden Park, Glasgow, presented! Never in the history of the game had such a crowd assembled to watch a match. The huge terraces were packed with a mass of humanity that had foregathered from all parts of Scotland, from England, Ireland, Wales, and from more distant spots. When I left Glasgow the exact official figures had not been got out, but I was authoritatively informed that the attendance was 121,452, and that the takings were £5500 admission and an additional £1800 in stand money, or £7300 for the match, It is prodigious! What will football become? Figures such as those I have quoted suggest a problem before which other problems are easy of solution, no matter how difficult they be. Does it mean doubling the capacity of the grounds of leading clubs? Is there to be no limit to the expansion of the popularity of the gamer This is a speculative subject, which requires the most careful consideration, for it will have to be tackled in earnest."