FOOTBALL NOTES

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1514, 7 March 1901, Page 32

FOOTBALL NOTES

' (BY “TOUCH.” The music of the bouncing ball will shortly be heard in Wellington once again. Bowing is all-right, and v cricket does to fill a gap, but the ne plus ultra of delight, the only game worthy of an ecstasy of admiration, is football. Just conjure up a picture of the Athletic Park, the seething, jostling, jubilant crowd of onlookers, the ponderous charge of a- heavy-weight pack, and the raucons-tonedi adjurations of a hundred throats beseeching “Cocky” to come on, or cheering on tne Ori’s to clear their line—just picture* mentally such a scene, I. say, and then ask yourselves whether the present nearness in time of the football season is not a matter for general gratulation. And now for some plain remarks about football matters generally.

The local clubs are bestirring themselves. and the annual meetings are to be on the tapis within a few days. The outlook for the ensuing season is very fair. The Oriental Club has lost a good man in Charlie Bush, who ha.s been transferred to Christchurch. Charlie was the mainstay of his club last season, bis superb defensive work standing the team in good stead in. every match. The Orientals, nevertheless, will, in my opinion, prove themselves to* be a, factor to be reckoned with this season, for they have to help them the' advantage of a year’s ■development on a team in which the majority of the members are yet in their teens.

“Morrie” Weed, who was absent from Wellington for a, while, has again returned to* the city of eternal calm —and Wellington football makes a* distinct gain by the fact. The Wellington Club, with his assistance, should make a. bold hid for championship honours. I hear that McLaughan bas made up his mind to again don the jersey and play for Ins old club.

Melrose, last year’s winners, are said to have lost the services of several of last year’s players through retirement, but the “old horses” of the red and blues have a knack of coming to the front when the bell rings for kick-off; and no doubt this year’s happenings will prove the general rule. The Athletic and the Old Boys’ Clubs are- said to be at least as strong in present prospects as they were last year, the former haying! secured inadvance the services* of a player yet to arrive in the city.

At the end of last season a meeting of the Wellington Bug,by Union was held to consider the advisableness of making overtures to the Wairarapa Football Association for amalgamation. The management committee of our local association was authorised by the meeting to arrange preliminaries fc-r giving effect to the junction of forces. Perhaps the management committee referred; to did move as requested*; but if they did they have at all events taken to heart the advice tendered by Li Hung Chang to a fellow conspirator to “sit tight and say nothing.” If anything definite has been done,, now is the* time for the committee to open its collective moirfrh.

The international football . match between England and Wales was played at Cardiff in January last, before about 40,000 spectators. The Welshmen wen the match by 13 points to nil. Bancroft, the Welsh full back in the match above-mentioned, was playing in his twenty-ninth international game. A paragraph in the “N.Z. Times” a few weeks back drew attention to the fact that football was gaining greatly in popularity in France. The Germans, too, are adopting the English national game. A team of German i footballers opened a tour in England in January, the first match being against the Southampton Club. The visitors, however, proved! no match for the Englishmen, and suffered defeat by 5 goals to* 1. The rhinoceros is a very favourite beast of luxury with Eastern potentates, and frequently figures in the accounts of Indian spectacular fights of wild beasts; though it is recorded that as a gladiator the rhinoceros is apt to b© disappointing, preferring to grub about in the arena for food to paying attention to the business in hand. The only thing which he is always ready to attack appears bo* be a. man; and there is, or used to be, a rhinoceros at the capital of Gwalior whose homicidal instincts provided much sport for subalterns quartered at Gwalior before the fort was surrendered to Sindia. The game only required two players besi'de the rhinoceros, and was very simple. The beast had an exceedingly violent temper and was confined in an enclosure half as large* as Leicester square, surrounded with pillars, between which a man could slip easily, but too close for the monster’s bulk to pass. Somewhere inside the enclosure his food bucket lay, andi the players, taking opposite sides of the enclosure, played football, with the bucket. It differed from ordinary football, because only one player could play at a time—the* rhinoceros

T-vas always looking; after the other—and you could never get in more than one kick, because the instant the rhinoceros heard the bang, he was round and after you like a locomotive This was the chance of the other who, dashing in at full speed after the beast, was able .to get in one good kick while rhino was narrowly missing his friend at the opposite barrier. Then it was his turn to flee, with the creature after him, and for the other side to get a kick. Half-time was always called when the rhinoceros began to play cunning and lurked near the bucket.