SPORT v. CAREER

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXVI, Issue 146, 5 June 1936, Page 3

SPORT v. CAREER

Does a Blue Help a Man COMBINING BOTH (Own Correspondent—by Air Mail) LONDON, April 29. Is sport too much of a fetish at the Universities ? Does success in sport help or hamper Oxford and Cambridge men in their careers says a writer in the “Evening News.” The Oxlord undergraduates’ own magazine, “The Isis,” asserts that success in sport can be bought too dearly and “success on the river is of no value in the business of earning a living.” ''The Isis” also claims that, at Oxford, “there is a saner attitude towards the value of sport than at Cambridge.” Sir Ernest Graham-Little, the distinguished physician and M.P. for London University, told the “Evening News” to-day: “There is a medical necessity, not ouly when you are an undergraduate but throughout life, to hnv e a certain amount of recreation. “But the question certainly does arise now whether sport has been elevated at Oxford and Cambridge to a position of importance which is altogether out of proportion to its usefulness in a man’s life. “If a young man takes up sport earnestly enough to strive for his blue in one or other of the major sporting activities he can do little else. “His scholarship must sutler. It is seldom that you get a combination of the young man who can rise to eminence in sport and in scholarship. “What it amounts to is that when a boy goes to Oxlord or Cambridge he has to ask himself, “Am 1 going m for sport or am 1 going to study, my profession ?’ “And the boy who is determined on a successful career has to say to himself, ‘Exercise is not going to bo the main object of my career.’ He has to put his studies first all the time and take up spurt as a means to the end ol physical fitness.” An Oxford point of view was given by another M.P., the Marquess ol Clydesdale, air pilot and boxer, who studied at Balliol College, famed for its scholarship. “The attitude towards sport at Oxford is quite sane,” he said. “The importance given to rowing is, at times, a little overdone, and I expect that is much the same at Cambridge. “But at Oxford—<and I imagine at Cambridge, too —study definitely comes first and sport afterwards. As a general rule I think games help.

“Young men who excel at games have a splendid preparation for life—apart from the phjsical advantages—because they meet many people, make many friends, and thus increase their knowledge of their fellow men. “There is one drawback. A man who has been accustomed to leading a very athletic life finds a sedentary occupation very difficult. It is absolutely essential that he should take some form of regular exercise, even if it is only on Saturday afternoons. Sport and scholarship can, and do, go together.” With that view Dr. Adolphe Abrahams, the physician who was medical officer to the British Olympic teams—he is an old Cambridge man —agrees. “You can cite magnificent examples of people who did very well indeed in sport and achieved great distinction in their work too,” he said. “There are many such men in the professions today.” Mr Arthur E. Porritt, the Oxford sprinter and ICO yards record breaker (now eminent in medicine), said, “Sport is of enormous value in many ways. The really good athlete usually does very well in life whatever career he takes up. My experience is that the vast majority of brilliant athletes become successful men. Sport in itself is an education and it helps to fit men for the more serious side of their life both at the University and after leaving it.”