INTEREST IN SPORT

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 124, 26 May 1920, Page 8

INTEREST IN SPORT

ASSOCIATION FOOTBALL ADVANCING. Like .other outdoor sports, Association football is again making steady progress, and this is the subject of pleasing comment by. the Council of the New Zealand Football Association in its annual report. There is every indication that an even stronger advance will now be made than before the war.

"As the game ; is well established in the four main centres," says the-report, "it should not be long before there is a big revival all over the Dominion. The demobilisation of our soldiers and the possible influx of numbers of immigrants in the near future should help to make this possible. There is a tremendous revival of the 'Soccer' code in England at the present time, and this should be felt here sooner or later.

"Probably no sport in New Zealand was hit harder by the recent hostilities than our game, but by appreciation of the difficulties we have had to face we should have little trouble in regaining in the 1921 season the position we liad reached in 1914. Then we had nine 'smaller associations affiliated, but they ! rapidly went to the wall in 1915. However, during the past season the game has been revived in Waikato, Wanganui, -and Poverty Bay, while we have had correspondence with Southland, Taranaki, and Napier which indicates that the game may be restarted in the centres at any time now. At the same time, we must not forget that it is the youth of the country which must be encouraged to play 'Soccer.' This was dearly shown during the war, when the four big cities were able to carry on the game with players under 20 years of age, while those associations who had no junioi" grades became non-existent."