LEAVES OF A SPORTFOLIO

Manawatu Times, Volume LV, Issue 7031, 15 December 1932, Page 10

LEAVES OF A SPORTFOLIO

Bewildered By Baxter—Gilbertian Rugby Muddle—An Affront To Cricket Honour

HUGBY FOOTBALL enthusiasts in New Zealand need not fear, now, that fixed placed in the scrummage are threatened seriously. Since all but a few clubs in England have coldly disregarded tile International Rugby Board’s notm-ious circular on the subject, inter alia, of the fixed formation in the scrummage, and since the South African Rugby Board has refused to adopt the board’s suggestion in this direction, the New Zealand Rugby Union, surely, would not have the hardihood to risk such a snub from the clubs in the Dominion as it must suffer were it to try to impose upon them the board’s expressed will in this matter. Just after the middle of October'the situation in England, on this question of the board’s circular, became quite Gilbertian. The Yorkshire and Somerset Rugby Unions had followed the board’s advice and had abolished fixed places from their scrum formations for matches in the county competition, but

\Vc in New Zealand have no great reason to love James Baxter, but we should give him credit for being a man with the courage of his convictions, and for being a man ardent in the cause of Rugby football—though some of his ideas conflict with ours —and a man who does not speak without deliberation. He would not “let down” his comrades on the International Rugby Board, and even the' fact that he, as much as any other man, was responsible for the modern specialisation in the scrummage in the Home unions would not cause him to make such a statement as he did at the Cheshire meeting without very good reason. apart from his own views. So his statement may be interpreted as an indication that the boord.has modicd the opinions expressed in its circular, or, at any rate, has come to the conclusion, perhaps forced upon it hy the generally cold reception of its circular. that'it is too late in tlie day to abolish fixed places in the set scrummage. a * #

PERHAPS some readers of these notes- are surprised at the refer- ' ence to James Baxter’s responsibility for modern specialisation in the scrummage* in the Home unions. Ever since the tour of the New Zealand team of 1905-06 some of the clubs in the United Kingdom and Ireland had toyed with the idea of fixed places in the scrummage, but it was not an “official” policy, until 1923, when the English Rugby Union’s Selection Committee, under the chairmanship of James Baxter, went “all out” for set places in the scrummage, and paid careful attention to the, physical types of players to fill those set places. The policy those selectors followed was developed still more in the following year, when W. W. Wakefield became captain of the English team. Wakefield developed, particularly, the art of “loose-forward” play, in its effect, offensive and defensive, on the play of backs, and Baxter was still chairman of the selectors who provided ■Wakefield with the material which he used in evolving the modern .system of forward play in England’s international Rugby. If. as seems probable, Baxter s remarks at the Cheshire meeting represent the latest attitude of the International Board, the board must have begun to realise that Law 15, in its present form, is not congruous with the definition of a scrummage, and that more regard should be paid to the definition. A scrummage is defined as being “formed by one or more players from each team closing round the ball when it is on the ground, or by their closing up in readiness to allow the ball to be put on the ground between them.’ The point to be observed is that a scrummage need not necessarily follow a 1 breach of a law; it can follow a tackle in which no breach has been committed. As. Baxter suggests, referees have become too prone to treat every scrummage as essentially a set one.. But the International Rugby Board itself has contributed to that tendency, by making tlie scrummage law too intricate.

GALL and wormwood to those good people who think of English cricket as enshrining all that is truly . sportsmanlike, all the commendable qualities that they sum up in the words “It is cricket,” and nothing that is gross, must be the remarks that leading Australian cricket critics have been making lately on the subject of the method of- attack adopted by the M.C.C. team.

THE bewildering statement was made by James Baxter, known to so many people as the manager. of the British Rugby team which visited New Zealand and Australia in 1930. Past president of the Rugby Union of England, and former chairman of that union’s Selection Committee, “Bim” Baxter is still a member of the Inter, national Rugby Board. Speaking at> the annual meeting of the Cheshire Rugby Union, of which lie is president, he said that in its circular the. board did not aim at abolition of specialised positions in the scrummage, but over-specialisa-tion. Referees (he continued) were largely at fault: when a player with the ball was tackled, play should be allowed to proceed on the “first up, first down” principle, without any stoppage for a scrummage to lie formed, and.'bad as Law 15 was, if the law were enforced there would be fewer stoppages and_thc game would be improved. (Law 15 is the one dealing with the scrummage.)

For example, take this, written by ,T. C. Davis, editor of the Sydney “Referee”: “Let Old England revert to the crashing, smashing, fire-’em-at-the-batsman’s-lcgs-and-body methods, while Australia retains the time-honoured well-proved merits of the true bonder's art to. win the day. As the holder of the Ashes, it were well that Australia should be- the exemplar.” J. C. Davis goes on to note the strangeness of England, the home of the. game, tlie hub of sportsmanship, drifting, in the greed for‘ victory, to ways that bring no honour- to the old game.

Other Australian critics have been writing in like strain. And it _ is clear that their comments are well .iustified. They say- that in the M.C.C. team’s match with an Australian eleven, in Melbourne, Larwood and Voce unashamedly bowled at the batsman’s body especially at Woodfull and Bradman. It is useless for anyone to offer the suggestion that the bowlers were doing 110 more than to exploit leg-theory attack. /They can do that, as lias been proved over and over again, without bowling at the batsman’s body or head. It was only this year that J. IL Hobbs made a public protest against the bowling methods of W. E. Bowes in a match at Ke.nnington Oval. The New Zealand cricketers who loured England last year experienced something of this kind, though nothing Was said in public about it at the time. Here is a significant story that a Ihcmber of the New Zealand team told me some time after the team returned. This New Zealander is a bowler as well as,a batsman. In one match Voce was bitting him on the body with the ball, as he had been hitting earlier batsmen in the. innings. When this particular Now Zealander got to Voce’s end of the wicket lie remonstrated with the bowler. “Ob', I’m sorry,” replied Voce. “I for-got-you arc a bowler. Of course bowler doesn’t hit bowler.” A.L.L.

As soon as Baxter’s statement was reported, the few adherents to the board’s circular tried to “explain” it. A faint suggestion tliat Baxter had been misreporled was soon abandoned; it was not heard of after the Cheshire Rugby Union’s Selection Committee chose a team for the county’s first match—some of the counties had started their intercounty matches much earlier —with the forwards in it very patently’ specialised. Baxter himself is chairman of the Cheshire Selection Committee. Baxter said that the board did not aim at abolition of specialised places in flic scrummage. Yet in its circular the board had said that it was of opinion thgt “since the introduction of fixed formation in the scrummages the standard of forward play in the four Home unions has seriously deteriorated, and that such formation is not in the best interest of the game or the players themselves.” Again, in this precious circular the board “strongly” urged that “so far as possible, the practice of limiting a player’s activities to one particular position should be discontinued.” The irreconcilability of Baxter’s statement—and his practice as chairman of the Cheshire selectors —with the boards circular is apparent at once.