OUT DOOR SPORTS

Observer, Volume 7, Issue 158, 22 September 1883, Page 8

OUT DOOR SPORTS

NOTICES.

Secretaries of all kinds of Clubs for the promotion of out-door sports will confer a favour by commujticating any items of interest connected wit?!. their sport, game, or pastime; more especially withrespecb to coming events. . Short sketches of sporting or pleasure excursion wilt be welcome, and, questions on all matters connected with sports will be gladly answered. All communications must be addressed to The Editor.

—The Auckland football team were photographed during the trip. — In the match, Gymnasiun v. Government Offices, on the Metropolitan on Saturday last, the former won by a goal and a try to a try. Cricket has been commenced by several of the junior clubs already. Two wickets were pitched on Surrey Hills last Saturday; Ned Mills, the well-known trundler of the Our Boys Club, being one of those practising. The Auckland Q-ymnastic Club's athletic entertainment took place in the Parnell Hall on Wednesday evening, too late for notice in this issue. Mr Keesing deserves credit for the pains he has taken in the training. I will talk about it next week. — Several instantaneous photographs were taken during the progress of the Dunedin match. One shows Whiteside doing a run, and another gives the "scrum," with Whiteside and King stooping behind realty for a dart. The light was too poor, however, to reader them striking pictures. — W. Houston, who used to be considered one of the best walkers here, has decided to return to the track, and will compete on the 9th November, in the Two Mile Walking Handicap. He is already in easy work, and will no doubt come out fit, as he has had a lot of experience with the " colts " of hia " stable " and on his own account in the past. —The Young Colonial Football Club is anxious to have a trial' with the Union Club, as the latter claim the premiership in junior football. A match was to have been played for a dinner some time ago, but, as Lecky, one of the Union team, was going South, it fell through. Now that he is back, the Union Club ought to play, and an interesting match might be expected. A. friendly game of football was played betweeA the Grafton Juniors and Wellesley-street School, which resulted in a victory for the latter by 4 points to nil. McCormack Jtwo), Lusk, Burton, and Ashton played well fjgf the former ; ■while Hawkins, Smart, Major, DaviHon and Muir did the work for the latter. Smfrfc and Major each secured tries, but no goals were kicked. — A very good game of football was played on Saturday between the Union Club and a team of Allcomers. The Surrey Hills paddock was the scene of the contest, which was won by the Club by twelve points. M. Monnock, the well-known sprinter, played in better form than he eyer shewed before, the drj ground evidently suiting him excellently. He got one try by a splendid dodgy run through the whole field. . An exciting game of football is looked forward to oh Saturday next, between the combined boot factory teams and the Young Colonial. The following are the combined : — Madigan, Healy (2), Mills, Goodman (2), Walker, Sexton, Elliott, Fairweather, Eliia, Murphy, Roach, O'Brien, and Porteous. The following will represent the Young Colonials : — T. Whiteside (captain), Warbrick, Cole, Ridings, McConnel, Berry, Pilkington, Laurie, Wooller, McHugh, Danks, Hardwick, Dewar (2), and Binney. Emergencies : Bailey and Barton. — My Gisborne correspondent kindly sends the following : — The match played at Napier between Giaborne and Napier resulted in a draw, each side securing a try. For Gisborne, Berry, the captain, who obtained the try for his side, played grandly, and was well supported by his team. Mill tackled in rare style, while Pavitt, L. Bees, Bull, and White worked hard and well. For Napier, Begg (captain), who secured the try for the home team, St. Hill, Cotterill, and Simpson played best. Mill obtained a try for Gisborne, but it was disallowed by the umpire. The Gisborne men had the best of the game nearly all through. — The following progamme has been decided upon for the 9th November sports, to be held in connection with the Cattle Show at Ellerslie. Mr Robert E. Ellis is acting as secretary, and will make the handicaps. I am endebted to his courtesy for this early information : — l5O yards' Handicap, prizes £8, £2, £1 ; 440 yards' Handicap, £5, £1 ; One Mile Handicap, £5, £2, £1 ; Two Mile Walking Handicap, £5, £2, £1 ; Two Mile Bicycle Handicap, £5, £2 in money or trophy ; 120 yards' Maiden Race £2, £1. This should give a good days' sport, and no doubt all the local cracks will have a dart for the good things. — So Slade has met the redoubtable John L. Sullivan at last. Judging from the report, it seems to have been just as well that they had soft gloves on, for Slade seems to have suffered a terrible plugging from his wonderful opponent. Monday last was, if I remember right, the date fixed for Slade's great fight with Mitchell. Tins is to be a " bare bones " affair, and should, if the half-caste only kept his heart up, have been a .grand event, Mitchell haying to give a lot of weight away, as well, as being much shorter than Slade. In exchange 'for these disadvantages, however, Mitchell is said to be the most scientific exponent of the <: noble art " at present on the boards. — f Rugbian " sends the following remarks in reference to the disputed try in the football match between Auckland and Wellington : — " I think that the character of both Mr Henderson and Mr Cotter for veracity are entirely above suspicion, and, for fair play there can only be one opinion, they are too impartial, if possible, and would either of them yield a point sooner than have any unpleasantness. For my part, I would take their statements before all the referees in Welling-

ton, be they (W)right or wrong. I have been j told by several spectators of the match of one thing done by tlie referee that will show his strict impartiality. When Ring had the ball* and had passed all the Wellington players, he was prevented from scoring by the referee running (W)right in front oi: him,, and thereby stopping him till the Wellington men were on him. This decidedly was perfectly (W)righb but not fair. Poor Auckland with only 14 men, and one of these so much injured as to be of very little use, would have scored then had it not been for the 16th man for Wellington. However, let us hope for better luck next time, Whiteside sound, and a sound referee, aud Auckland will be able to let Wellington see how football should be played." — An old football player at Gisborne has sent us the following extracts from "The Football Annual, 1882," relativei to the alteration of tha off-side laws in the I^ugby Union Code, as requested in some -remai'ks which wore contained in a former issue : — At d special general meeting, held in London in the middle of January, the " oiTj side " question was di^ciissed. No vote was taken, but the committee promised to consider the question and 6ubmit proposals at the March general meeting. A vejry strong feeling on this subject was manifested rjby the Yorkshire representatives. They wer|3 strongly in favour of having penalties for the' infringement of the " offside" laws. It was argued " that men intentionally broke the existing' laws on this point " — a fact to which we have made reference — and that it was absolutely necessary to meet this blot on the game. The Rugby Union Committee carefully considered the question^ aud at the March meeting the following alterations; were carried : — To add to Law No. 23 : In case any player plays- the ball when he is off-side, ths captain of the opposite Bide may claim that the ljall be taken back and put down at the place wjiere it was last played before the off-side play occurred. That Law No. 25 read thus : When a player has the ball, none of his opponents who at the time are off-side may commence or attempt to run, tackle, or otherwise interrupt such player, until ho has run five yards or taken his kick. But if any player when offside tackles, or in any way interferes with an opponent who has the ball before such opponent has run five yards or taken his kick, the captain of the opposite sido may claim a free kick for the player so interfered with] such free kick shall be either a punt or a drop-kick from the spot where the interference took pla^e, and shall be taken in accordance with the conditions of Law 44 ; such free kick shall not count % goal. The " off-side " question has always bepn a difficulty, and in the past most leading authorities on the game have steadily put their faces against the suggestion of " penalties." However, tjhe evil which they are to meet has grown to sucli dimensions that many who were opponents of " penalties " voted in favour of trying an experiment on the subject. These alterations will still further increase the powers of the umpires. -This is to be regretted, as their place in the game is daily becoming more important. They have gVeat power for good and evil; it is therefore most necessary that men should be chosen for this office who have an impartial mind and a thorough knowledge of the laws. In referring to the( position of umpire, his task would be made much easier if players would carefully study the laws ;.jit is extraordinary how ignorant many men are of them. Several disputes would have been Avoided if players had proper acquaintance with all the details of the laws of the game. The only other alteration made at the March meeting was the addition of the word, "only," after " kick at goal," in Law 60. It now reads as follows : — " Neither ' half- j time' or 'no-side' shall be called until the ball is j fairly held, or goes out of play, and in case of a j try or fair catch the kick at goal ' only ' shall le allowed." The Rugby Union then (March '82) j mustered 130 clubs as members, but a large number of clubs play the rules which are not actual members. — The attitude of the Wellington Press continues to be fiercely antagonistic to Auckland in the matter of the late football match, and the papers still howl out their anathemas on Henderson, and the righteousness of Wellington's claim to the disputed try ; but I notice that it is the newspaper men who do all the blathering. The | footballers are temperate in their tone, and quietly discuss pros and cons. I have had a copy of the Wellington Post — the journal which has exceeded all others in the violence of its attacks and in the venom displayed in its one-sided reports on the matter — and really I little wonder at the way it works itself into a flurry over the affair when I read the report of the game published in the same issue that contained its first attack on our boys. This report (?) is chock-fuil of glaring inaccuracies, distorted facts, utter falsities, and incorrect terminology. The same person who wired the account to the Auckland Star must haye written this, as he makes the same blunder in not distinguishing between a "place" and a " drop" kick. In fact, the sentence reads exactly the same as it did in the local papers, a kick-off by Warbrick being called a " fine high drop." So evident is the writer's ignorance of the game and all appertaining to it, that it is not surprising when the poor imbecile got on the theme of the rights and wrongs of the dispute, he should struggle hopelessly in the slough of technicalities, and try to get even by going in for wholesale and brutal abuße of the side which did not carry his half -crown. If the proprietor of the Post is not too proud to take a little friendly advice from a disinterested reader, I would suggest that it would be wise in future to pay a man who at least knows something of the rudiments of football to report an interprovincial match, where so much depends on a knowledge of the subject; and when he has got such a one, it would also be prudent to keep some check on his copy, and not admit the incoherent ravings of: a man whose bias placed him temporarily off his "chump," and whose writings brought down such a very unanimous storm of censure and ridicule on the paper. The question meanwhile remains unsettled — Was the try fair or unfair ? readers ! will no doubt remember that on the morning of Saturday, the Bth instant (the day of the match), the Herald published telegrams from Wellington, giving the conditions under which the match was to be played. Now, these conditions must have been settled fully the night previous, or they could not' have been wired to the . Herald in tinVe for publication. One of these conditions was to

the following effect : — " Eitlier umpire is to have power to at once call the ball back on the occurrence of any unfair piece of play." That this arrangement was correctly reported and fully understood by both sides, I am assured by every individual member of the Auckland team, as well as by several friends who were in company with the team. But I see Wellington repudiates any knowledge of such an arrangement (at least, one of the Post's authorities — I fancy it was Wright, the referee — does), and how unwarrantably the rule I have quoted, agreed upon previous to the match, will prove. Well, on this understanding, Cotter "calls a ball back" for a "throw-on" actually before it is caught by the "off-side" man, and, in consequence of this recall, none of the Auckland men interfere with the runner until he gets to Webster, who contents himself with shouldering the man into " touch," but hearing the cries of " come back," Webster takes no further trouble, and allows another man (Webb), to whom the first (Perry) passed the ball, to run quietly in and touch-down. Now, Firth acknowledges tuat he did not see the foul play ; but, not content to act up to the arrangement, he appeals to the referee — a strong partisan of Wellington, who, of course, though he knew no more about it than that he saw Webb run in, promptly decided in favour of Wellington. The stand taken by Auckland is unquestionably the correct one, viz. : — That it was no case for a referee's decision ; the power had been left in the hands of the umpire to check unfair play, and the recall had been co prompt as to take the matter entirely out of the hands of both the other umpire and the referee. License to recall was given te either umpire j the recall was sounded, the ball was deud, and no man could run with it ; it should have been brought back and " hacked off " at the place where the breach of rules took place. The only way to settle the matter will be to refer it to the Southern Unions for decision, and on the premises given above, which are the correct ones, they will, I have little doubt, decide that Cotter was the only authority on the dispute.