THE LEAGUE TEST.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18548, 23 August 1928, Page 9

THE LEAGUE TEST.

To The Editor. Dear Sir, I was an onlooker at the notorious League test match in Dunedin. Having read in the Christchurch papers the controversy which has been raised, I beg your leave to express my amazement at the attitude of those who have a word to say in defence of what was a disgraceful exhibition. One of the English managers admitted at the dinner in Dunedin that it would have been better if the game

had not been played. The plain truth of the matter is that the League officials should make an abject apology to the public for what occurred. In the interests of sport, and even from the selfish viewpoint of the interests of the League game, such an attitude rather than accusations of bias, would be more fitting. The match in Dunedin will go down to history as the dirtiest game seen on the playing fields of New Zealand, and the desire to brawl was so persistent and so widespread, that there must have been very many like myself, who came to the conclusion that there is something radically wrong with the conduct of a game and the personnel of the teams to make such a deplorable spectacle possible. The “ Sydney Referee,” a paper which has always boomed the League game, and cannot be accused of bias, says in reference to the Auckland referee's comment (that the English players were a lot of “squealers”) that the present team is the worst team that has ever visited Australia for questioning the referee’s decisions. What is coming over professional sport? In a recent prominent boxing contest in Sydney, the contestants butted each other like goats, and a reputable, capable referee looked on unperturbed. In professional wrestling punching, biting and kicking are now accepted as part of the game. In League football, with the keen business interests behind it, very nasty elements have crept in. Could anybody’s wildest imagination carry him to the length of imagining two teams brought up in the traditions of the colleges and high schools sinking to the level of Saturday’s degrading spectacle? It has been asserted, and not without reason, that the Rugby Union game has been cleansed of some of its worst elements by the introduction of the League game. In the light of the disgraceful conduct of a section of the last New Zealand League team in the English tour, followed by the latest exhibition in Dunedin, there would seem to be very substantial grounds for the foregoing assertion. For it must always be remembered that international sides should be exemplars of the highest and best traditions, both on and off the field. Plainly there is something rotten in the state of Denmark.—l am, etc., THE GAME’S THE THING.