PROS AND AMATEURS

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 60, 27 March 1937, Page 14

PROS AND AMATEURS

PERMISSION TO PLAY TOGETHER INTERNATIONAL HOCKEY Constitutional changes permitting the mixing of amateurs and professionals in national and international hockey competition and settling the status of players in world, Olympic and European championships were approved by the congress of the Ligue Internationale de Hockey sur Glace, held in London in February. The outstanding change permits two professionals to play with an amateur team in international matches, In national league games, teams composed entirely of professionals may play with teams purely amateur and the mixed status will be allowed in friendly national and international matches. International league competition .will be on a strictly amateur basis with each team permitted to use two foreign amateurs. The Ligue decided that players must be born in the country they xepresent in world, Olympic and European championships. Players born in one country, but who learn to play hockey in another must he residents of their native lands for five years prior to representing their native countries in international tournaments. They are to be barried from representing their native countries if they have previously represented their adopted lands in international competition. Aimed at the future, this clause does not bar from international play a number of English players, who learned the game in Canada and are now playing for England. "The general feeling of Ligue members is that they do not mind playing one Canadian team, but they are against playing two or three Canadian tnams who represent other parts of the Empire in international competition," commented President Paul Loiq, B^Jgian head. of the Ligue.