SOCCER SIDELIGHTS PASSING NOTES

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 438, 21 August 1928, Page 11

SOCCER SIDELIGHTS PASSING NOTES

(By

Perseus

Another Trophy Goes South.—lt is quite a long time since Auckland held no national trophy for the round ball code, but after losing the F.A. trophy, for a time, the hopes of retaining the Chatham Cup went South on Saturday. The Young Men are entitled to every credit for the gallant fight they put up to become the national cup winners, and for a team of young players their performance in the North Island final was full of merit. Y.M.C.A. has the satisfaction of knowing that it went down to a better combination, and one which had cleaned up all the leading clubs in the capital city. Petone has to be warmly congratulated on its great performance during the first season in senior Soccer, and it would now ap-

pear to have a mortgage on the Chatham Cup in the final on Saturday. But there is as much uncertainty about cup-tie Soccer as cricket.

Cup Tie Games.—The rousing struggle on Saturday illustrated the extraordinary margin that exists between a knockout cup-tie, and the ordinary club championship game. In the excitement of fighting for glory or oblivion all the careful planning and plotting of captains and coaches are forgotten. The more subdued charms of team work, carpet wearing and pattern making disappear in the hustle and bustle of the cup tie game, even among the champion clubs, and a team worth tens of thousands of pounds in transfer fees is often outed by an eleven costing only a few pounds. There is no time in the excitement of a cup-tie for the liner touches or studied tactics, and the two differing types of games may be likened to a boxing contest and a knockout fight. In a boxing contest the more skilful wins on points, but one blow from a fighter may settle the issue. YLM.’s hopes ran high on Saturday when it got the first blow in, but the steady hammering of Petone in the second spell told its tale, and the Auckland lads went down to a superior attacking force. Bright Schoolboy Display.—The two trial games between the schoolboy representatives on Saturday were watched with keen interset by those who look forward to the future of the code, and the splendid display given by both the primary and secondary school lads raises high hopes for the progress of the game in the years ahead. The game is now in full swing at all the principal secondary schools, and much of the old time prejudice against the dribbling code has now died out. In fact many parents who are Rugby enthusiasts are now encouraging their boys to take on the round ball game in their tender years, and learn the value of ball control with the feet. Mothers, too, have a warm spot for the Soccer sport, as it means less devastation with school clothes, and not quite so much demand for iodine and boric lint.

Touring School Teams.—The school holidays will find three Auckland teams of young Soccer enthusiasts travelling to keep representative engagements, and the trips are eagerly anticipated. The primary school reps journey to Huntly as guests of the miners to take part in the North Island championship tournament. The district schoolboys showed excellent form against the junior secondary team on Saturday, and have high hopes of carting the Webster Shield back to Auckland. The selectors this year would seem to have gone for weight as a valuable asset, but recalling last year’s tournament on Victoria Park, and the games with the Aussie schoolboys, the battle is not always to the beefiest brigade, nor victory to the strong. Brains and ball control are more often deciding factors in a Soccer struggle than height or avoirdupois. Still, all things being equal, a good big Tin is always better than a good little ’un, and the Auckland boys have every reason for their cheerful hopes of victory at Huntly. Secondary Teams for Wellington.— Another milestone in the progress of the game will be marked on Saturday, when two teams of secondary school boys will meet rival combinations from the Wellington schools, and the games should prove attractive curtain-raisers to the Chatham Cup final. The boys were sorely disappointed on .Saturday that fate was not kinder to Y.M.C.A., and so given the boys an opportunity of cheering their big brothers to a cup victory against the hope of Otago, but the school boys have a chance of revenge by cleaning up their Wellington rivals. The senior eleven is a fine combination of clever young exponents, and if they can only reproduce in Wellington the splendid display given against the sturdy Fourth Division team on Saturday, the Wellington enthusiasts will enjoy a treat in the way of sparkling Soccer.

English Soccer Sensation.—Recent files contain details of the greatest sensation ever known in the historv of British Soccer, when the F.A., at its annual summer meeting on June 30. dealt out wholesale fines and suspensions to a number of clubs, officials and players taking part in the Durham County amateur competitions. Twelve club were fined a total of £385. this money to go to charities nominated by the Durham Football Association. On the recommendation of the commission appointed 342 players and 61 club officials were suspended for periods varying from six to 12 months. The bombshell probably means the bursting up of the Northern League (an institution almost as old as the F.A.), as only two members of the Management Committee survive, and 255 of the 465 players of last season have been declared professionals. No Sham Amateurs.—The whole trouble among the “Geordie’s” originated, singularly enough, with the permanent suspension of a club called the

“Crook” Town Football Club, which furnished the F.A. with sworn statements proving that other clubs were ignoring rule 29. After a searching inquiry by a special commission it was found that the clubs had made a general practice of paying “amateur” players in excess of the “expenses actually and necessarily incurred by them,” and these players were professionals parading and playing as amateurs. The F.A. takes every precaution to protect amateur clubs against poaching by other clubs, yet after these clubs had specifically applied for this protection they proceeded to ignore the amateur definition, which should have been well known to them. As remarked here before, the F.A. has no objection to professionalism, and both amateurs and pros, play together and against each other, but the “shamateur” receiving payment “under the table,” or sub rosa, gets short shrift when he is found out. The Durham culprits are talking of seceding and forming a separate association, but this would mean world wide disqualification outside their own narrow circle, and that is not an additional punishment that players are inclined to apply to themselves.