SATURDAY, AUGUST 20, 1904. IMPERIAL FOOTBALL. The New Thread of Kinship.

Free Lance, Volume V, Issue 216, 20 August 1904, Page 6

SATURDAY, AUGUST 20, 1904. IMPERIAL FOOTBALL. The New Thread of Kinship.

MANY things indigenous to the Motherland, if transplanted to the cheerier soil of New Zealand, flourish more luxuriantly than m their native habitat. Rugby football is one of them. Last Saturday's great Imperial match is an . abjectrlesson that cannot fail in appealing very strongly to the manliest sentiments. The pick of New Zealand footballers met the pick of British footballers on a friendly battlefield, fought strenuously for supremacy, and achieved it. # * * Without that magnificent crowd, and devoid of the wide colonial interest it commanded, the game would have effected no extraordinary benefit. But the fact that tens of thousands of New Zealanders and Australians were interested in the friendly rivalry between the sons of John Bull and those of John Bull jumor raises the event to one of Imperial significance. • ♦ • The men from Home, as well as our own representatives, have been picked for their pre-eminence as footballers To have achieved distinction m the great Imperial game, every man had perforce to practice much self-denial, self-discip-lme, and undergo a rigorous and useful course of training No man not quick of thought, prompt m action, and having self-control m its best form, can ever hope to become a "top-notcher," and it is because a sound body is conducive to a sound mind, and vice versa, that the game of football and all other athleticsports in which the British race excels is countenanced and advocated by the best thinkers and the greatest statesmen, as well as the common sense of Tom, Dick, and Harry True, m the exuberance of spirits footballers sometimes act as all men may when the blood is stirred Still, hoodlum ism is, happily, infrequent enough to cause little anxiety, and the splendid control of the game by the governing bodies has reduced unpleasant "incidents" to a minimum Football, played for all it is worth by the best exponents of the game fiorn any colony or country within the Empire, weaves the silver thread of kinship into a rope that binds the out-posts of the Empire closer to the Old Land * * # It makes us better known to Britain, and it makes Britain better known to us It shows us that the mind is not neglected in the worship of muscle, for, taking either contesting team at Saturday's great match, we find that

many of the players had achieved scholastic distinctions which, together with a good physique and the health necessary to "play the game with vigour, must fit them to "play the game ' of life with the self-con-trol, the coolness, and the good humour that generally prevails on the football field. * * * Every man, woman, and child at the Athletic Park on Saturday felt as if he or she was playing in that match When the umbrellas, the caps, and the handkerchiefs went up in the air it showed a young nation'^ pride m itself and its representatives' achievements We are own bi others to Australia, as well as younger sons of John Bull, and we should have welcomed as warmly a success by the British team, who are of our blood, as the success of our own boys Why not link closer to Australia 1 ? We don't want to federate m government, but we might federate in football. To send the part of a team to Australia to play in conjunction with the "reps " of the States against our British brothers would have helped along the friendly feeling we should have for our km over the Tasman Sea. * * * We who live under the British flag want to know more of our distant kinsmen Exchange cf thought and sentiment will help Imperialism. If such a thing were possible — if foreign nations "played the game," — we can conceive nothing that would help along the blessings of universal peace m a surer way than an Imperial team of athletes drawn from every quarter of the Empire ready and willing to undergo a campaign of manly sports in countries whose people do not now us well enough. * * * At the risk of pandering to the good conceit of themselves, New Zealanders m the infancy of nationhood must necessarily have, they have been showing a marked expertness in so many branches that the Motherland and other countries must respect the strenuous youngsters of the far-off colony Wherever and whenever New Zealanders are called upon to exercise the qualities they possess in any branch of art, learning, commerce, or sport may they "play the game" as manfully as they and their British brothers played it on that memorable Saturday last week