ROUGH FOOTBALL.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10756, 30 April 1913, Page 4

ROUGH FOOTBALL.

CASE OF THE BOYS' HIGH SCHOOL. MR BEY AN - BROWN THINKS UNION'S ATTITUDE UNSATISFACTORY

VIEWS OF OLD BOYS,

At a meeting of the committee of the Canterbury Rugby Union last night a letter was read from Mr C. E. BsvanBrowj], headmaster of the Boys' High School, complaining of the rough and foul play of which, lie alleged, the Lyttelton Pirates had been guilty in their match against the High School on Saturday. The Union, in discussing the matter, took up the attitude that it was the business of the School, playing on its own grouud to see that spectators were kept off the line. It was contended that if this were done there would' be no incitement to roughness-

Mr .Bevan-Brown, interviewed this morning concerning the matter, said that he considered that the Union had not treated the matter with Sufficient seriousness. To say that the invasion of the ground by spectators in the portion near the touchline was any excuse for dumping, or for the interchange of blows on tile part of players, was absurd. In any case, even if this were so, it was obviously impossible for the masters of the school to keep all spectators off the line. The boys of the school were frequently warned to keep off the ground at matches, and he thought that, instead of the spectators following the example of the schoolboys in crossing the line, it was the other way about, the boys following the example of other spectators. The members of the Union, in stating that the School should control the matches played on its own ground, could only have meant that masters should patrol the lines. But the authority- oi masters did not extend to ordinary spectators. If the recurrence of the offence hampered the progress of the match, it was surely the duty of the referee to blow his whistle, stop the game, and refuse to allow it to resume until the line- was cleared.

'' It is a very serious thing for a boy to be struck, or brutally handled, whilst playing," continued Mx Bevan-Brown.

"When fully-ojrown men are playing other men it is reprehensible enough, but there is always the saving circumstance that the parties are physical equals. The fact that football, properly played, is a contest of athletic skill and agiiitv. and not of sheer, untrained physical force, enables boys to take part in it. to compote on equal terms, and to win against opponents of mature physique. But tor one of these boys to be struck, or brutally handled, , in a manner quite outside of the ordinary roughness of football, is extremely bad for them as future footballers and as possessors of physical courage. It tends to make the best and pluckiest of hoys timid, and to diminish his spirit, if he has the feeling that at any time he may be deliberately injured by a fully-grown man. Next year I shall have to refuse to allow the boys to phu-t-he Lyttelton Pirates unless I have some undertaking that there shall be no recurrence of the roughness I have been compel led to complain of.'' HTv.H SCHOOL FOOTBALL. The history of Boys' High School football has been one of the strongest arguments that could he adduced against opponents of Rugby football, who would contend that it is a game, superiority in which depends on a relatively superior amount of brute strength. For years past the School has put in the field a team composed of boys, some of whom have been as young as fourteen, and very few indeed of whom have been over eighteen years of age. to take part in the President's Cup competition. They have been opposed to teams of which there was prohablv not one whose aggregate weight was not considerably greater than their own. with the exception of the Christ's College team, to which, indeed, the same remarks apply as to the School. Yet the High School has always been near the top of the competition. and has obtained a name for clean, fast, sporting nlny which draws to its matches each Saturday ;i larger crowd of spectators than assembles at any other match in any competition outside of the Senior Grade, with the exception, of course, of the Christ's College matches. The hoys have hnd to take hard knocks, but they have taken them, as they ought to take them, as a part of the o-nnie and have not grumbled, and their sporting instincts have won them a host- of bnrraekers who have never been connected in any wnv with the School. If at times they have considered that thev ha v e been treated with more roughness than was necessrry. they have considered it part of the game to keep ouiel about it. and old boys who have played in the School fifteen themselves, appear to l>e unanimous in the opinion that, unless the old spirit is dead a mono- the beys, it must have been soniethiiui out of the ordinary iluit caii-ed thom to ma he a public complaint.