FOOTBALL.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 288, 18 April 1889, Page 3

FOOTBALL.

[from oub own correspondent.) Napier, last night. Football is now in full swing here. The first match of the season, Pirates v. Harriers, on Saturday, resulted in a draw. The Wellington Athletic Club play the Napier Club on Saturday afternoon, and the Ponekes (Wellington) will visit Napier aud play the Pirates.

It is to be hoped that Gisborne footballers are making preparations for their visit to Napier.

We expect that Jimmy Scott will give us a good set to when he brings his mon out.

Arrangements are being made for a match Pakehas v. Maoris, at Captain Tucker's paddoch on Saturday. A scratch match will be played on Easter Monday.

A Chat with Mr J. B. Scott. The following extracts from an interview with Mr J. R. Scott, are taken from an English paper :—

‘ Although I am not quite certain as to the date,’ said Mr Scott, ‘I think Mr Tom Henderon, of Auckland, may be considered the father of New Zealand football. It must be about thirteen or fourteen years since he started a club at Auckland, and the sport has advanced at that place with such leaps and bounds that Lillywhite received no less than £640 for two matches there, being 80 per cent, of the gate. Our champion gate here has been that at Newport, Monmouthshire, when, on Boxing Day, the gross receipts were £307.

‘ And right here let me say that home gates compare very unfavorably with the colonial. For this there are several reasons. Firstly, as in the case of Bradford, Yorkshire, the prices are 3d and 6d,’while a New Zealand gate is Is admission, and 2s more for the stands. _ But there is another thing which greatly iuteferes with the financial success of a football tour—the. free admission of members. When the English team came to the colonies the ‘free list’ was entirely suspended, press only excepted, and members, and even the club committees, paid up like men. When I tell you that at one match we have played in the north there were upwards of 2,000 free admissions formembers and ladies, it can be Been that this is serious.

1 Oh, yes ! I know certain people have Called me grasping, but when a man has sunk capital that runs into thousands, and expenses of over a hundred a week, and all to be recovered in six months, if possible, it is apt to make him look sharp; ‘ Whether this tour pulls through financially or not—and there oould not possibly be a great margin of profit—l am glad to say that my ‘ backers ' are all sportsmen to the backbone, and the record we have mad# will go far to recompense them. 1 One of the funniest things about it all is the fact that the Colonial press and a large section of the public discouraged the enterprise from the first. No, not on financial grounds ; but they said my team could not beat a schoolboy club !in England. They must have changed their mind by this time,’ said Mr Scott, in whose eya there is at times a very humorous twinkle, ‘Yes, we insure. When I first landed, that übiquitous gentleman, the accident insurance agent, called and solicited me the favor, etc. I insured the team for the season for an eighteen-guinea premium. Before the end of the fortnight I had a knee-cap and a collarbone to be settled for. The manager of the company came over from Liverpool and stood beside me during a match. When half time was called he said, “ Is this Rugby football’’’ “Yes,” said I. “Is this the way it is generally played. It seems very dangerous." “Well,” I answered, “Rugby football is not a drawing-room entertainment any way you look at it. ” ' The manager agreed to give me six weeks' allowance for the collar-bone and three for the knee cap—£27- Then he asked me how often we played. 1 said, “ About three times a week, but that his agent had not limited us.” He went away looking very sad, and next day I received about seventeen pounds of my eighteen-guinea premium back ; with an intimation that the company preferred to terminate the policy. I now pay a pound a match insurance, which is about fair to both sides. But that first insurance agent made his o wn terms.

I We go back through Australia, playing in Adelaide, Melbourne, and Sydney, where we confidently expect to do well. There they play a sort of hybrid game. It is so distinct in character that I have actually brought Mr Lawl or, a well-known Australian cricketer and all-round athlete, all the way home with me to coach my team in Victorian football while in this country. The game is played twenty a-side and there is no off-side ; but when tbe player is running with the ball, he must bounce it on the ground every seven yards, The umpire is the hardest worked man in the game, as he must be always with the ball, and is invariably an old footballer, and receives a guinea fee. We shall have great gates in Australia, and also on our way home through New Zealand. ‘Are my men rough?’ ‘No; Ido not think so. Keogh has, somehow or other, acquired somewhat of a reputation for being so, but, clever as he is, he has not the physique. On the other hand, Ihimaira—- “ Smiler,” as he is nicknamed—is so powerful that if he throws anyone the man must feel it; but then, as happened the other day in a match in the north, when the aggrieved party arose, on hostile thoughts intent, the good-naturerl Hercules approached with his sweetest smile, and with outstretched hand, said in his quaint way, “ I beggee your part don.” Whereon the would-be belligerent burst out laughing. Men of the size of Dave Stewart, who is 6ft 2|in, high, weighs 14st 121 b., and is only 19 years of age, are apt to be a trifle heavy-handed. Nearly all ot my team speak excellent English, and are well educated, and I was immensely amused on coming into the bar of a Birmingham hotel to find the fair Hebe solemnly teaching three of the smartest of them their letters, while the poor benighted natives were [gravely making mistakes on purpose, and “ taking it all in ” from a lady whose “ h’s " were somewhat promiscuous—which is not a colonial failing.

‘ It is about twelve months since the idea of picking a team to visit the country was first mooted to the captain, Mr Joe Warbriok, and they have played together more or less ever since. On landing in this country the weakest point about thorn was declared, by both press and public, to be their ‘ passing. ’ But so greatly have they profited by watching their opponents’ play that it is now about their strongest department. Many of the men are undoubtedly stale, as must naturally be the ease, when it is considered that we have played as many as .five matches in six days. Bnt though their condition may have gone back since they stepped off [board-ship, where they worked hard all the time at running, horizontal bar, and with an occasional turn at shovelling eoal, they are certainly immensely improved as a team.