“A NATION OF FOOLS.”

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 9 May 1925, Page 10

“A NATION OF FOOLS.”

DOCTOR ON BRITISH GAMES. Dr. J. Johnstone Jervis, the city medical officer at Leeds, speaking on “unsportsmanlike sports,” said that, remembering the numbers who watched football and cricket, instead of playing, he was inclined to call Britain a nation of fools, not of sportsmen. Britain claimed to be a. nation of sportsmen, hut one must discriminate between the arena and the amphitheatre. The men of the arena were the me n playing the game, not the thousands of spectators. The spectator might talk sport- at any length; he might the club colours, hut he was not a sportsman. He deprecated the introduction of money . and money values into sport. Wigan, he read, had arrievd at the conclusion that it could not produce a great player and was importing them from the colonies. Leeds United had come to the conclusion that it must seek its men outside Leeds. Was it that Leeds was unable to produce young men of sufficient virility to achieve success in the game of football? A country who could produce a Sutcliffe could produce footballers. Advice given by Dr. Jervis was: — Piny should not he such as to fatigue the body, but enough to stimulate it. Since the best effect came from the direct play of sunlight upon the naked skin, the player should he as nearly nude as possible; a loin cloth, even in the climate of Leeds, should suffice. The “tired feeling” more frequently came from too little use of the muscles than from too much. Exercise should he taken regularly, and not in the evenings, when the body was tired but in the early mornings. Football and cricket and rowing were A 1 games for A 1 men; the B2 men, half a crock, or middle-aged men played golf; the 03 man. wholly a crock, was content with howls. If one wanted illustrations of premature senility one might find them abundantly on howling greens.