CLEAN SPORT

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 6314, 14 September 1907, Page 6

CLEAN SPORT

Wo never omit an opportunity of emphasising the necessity there is for purity in our athletic sports if we aspire to being a thoroughly sound and healthy community. Though sport is a thing for youth, an interest in sport and the furtherance of wholesome sport are things becoming to every period of life. AVo heartily welcome, therefore, the conference of leading officials from tho various sports organisations of New Zealand, which sat in deliberation on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. No doubt the reasons for such a federation are numerous, union in sports, as elsewhere, being strength. But, as was very clearly stated by the mover of the first resolution, Mr E. Nordou, tho one black smirch on sport in this country, the stain which makes so much of our sport “dirty” sport, is the betting element; and involved in this consideration is professionalism, as tho greater includes the less. AVe are not of those who grumble because our young men devote their Saturday afternoons to cricket, football, or rowing instead of poring over Henry George or Malthus on population, with tho view of qualifying to become pillars of Parliament. If there is any undue infringement of tho of business by the concerns of sport, that indeed is a thing to be deplored; and this no doubt is a form of abuse which is likely to creep in to some extent. But the more widely spread the moderate and rational love of outdoor sport is the better; and it is to be wished that every young mau in tho community should devote a certain weekly amount of his time to healthy, outdoor recreation. Only, tho sport must be clean. It must bo sport for sport’s sake, without any ulterior thought of how to turn a dishonest penny on the game. When young men take up a sport with the avowed intention of making money out of it, the game ceases to be a sport, and becomes a business, and too frequently a very dirty business. AVe are far from saying that professionals need be anything else than honest men. But it is acknowledged on all hands that professionalism in sport is beset with temptation to crookedness, which it requires exceptional strength of character ,to resist. So much is this the case that no' young man can take up sport as a profession without that loss of general respect which every mau experiences when he goes into doubtful company. Therefore, we welcome a federation of sports organisations which places first in its programme the discouragement of gambling and professionalism. No doubt the federation, when it gets to work, will take up also the matter of other crying abuses, that, for ’example, of foul language at sports gatherings. The other day we had a member of the foverning body of one of our leading schools objecting to the boys of the school playing with outside clubs, because of the possibility of tlieir having to listen to improper language. Apart from the fact that this is a matter which a headmaster should bo left to deal With, as no doubt would have been done by the headmaster in this instance, we should deprecate on all accounts the grandmotherly solicitude which would wrap college boys up in cotton-wool. Nevertheless, the fact remains 1 that this seripns protest was made in connection with a football match in this city. Rugby unions know that the use of foul language on match grounds is one of the matters which cause them trouble, and, therefore, they will welcome any federation of sports organisations which will strengthen their hands in dealing with this disgusting offence. 1 Altogether, the new federation is not likely to rust for want of work to dp, and we are sure that its formation will bo cordially welcomed by the many who, while they believe in the hygienic value of the various sports, have had hitherto too much reason to distrust the purity of certain sports as at present conducted.