Sport! Who needs it?

I hadn’t intended to write about football today, of all days. Frankly, I’d rather forget the appalling display I and about 20 million other people in the UK witnessed yesterday, but it’s hard to avoid. I’m really a rugby man, and I’d be quite happy to go back to reading the humourous texts flooding into my Nokia about the England team. However…

I think I’ll leave it to the LA Times to say what I think. The article’s worth a read, but this section sums it up for me:

“The sad truth of the matter is that England’s players, with few exceptions, are an arrogant, ignorant and unpleasant lot. They are paid far too much by their Premier League clubs, where their true allegiance lies, and their ability individually and collectively in an England shirt does not match their swagger.

It is not too much to say that the worthless and nationalistic English tabloids are reflected in the English team. It’s all about drinking, drugs, womanizing, gambling, fast cars and slow minds. Little England written large.”

Gawd… On a positive note though, Lampard’s disallowed goal will give football bores something to whinge about for the next 40 years or so.

The link from football to today’s witterings, though, isn’t as tenuous as may first appear. Part of the reason we set this blog up was to highlight state-sponsored stupidity at all levels. To let the cleansing light of day fall upon the dunderheads and control-freaks who try to control us and the minutiae of our lives. Often, there is so much material we are unable to choose, and fall into some form of writer’s block, unable to put finger to keyboard. It gives me great pleasure, therefore, to present this towering, and sadly rather lonely example of commonsense. It is positively guaranteed to whip the Guardianistas into a lather of righteous pontification, and all the better for that.

The Telegraph reports that Jeremy Hunt, the Culture Secretary and Conservative MP for South West Surrey has launched a “School Olympics” initiative. He says that the move would “get rid of this myth that competitive sport is bad for children”. As an old boy of Charterhouse School, he’d have first hand experience of the value of proper, competitive sports at school.

Mr Hunt continues:

“We have to realise that sport is a good thing,” he said. “It does not damage your self-esteem, it helps to strengthen your self-esteem because sport is often about picking yourself up, which is what I guess we are doing today [after England's World Cup exit].”

He added: “Sport – whether you win or lose – teaches young people great lessons for life. It encourages teamwork, dedication and striving to be the best that you can be.”

Apparently, under the new plans, schools will be expected to compete against each other in an Olympics-style event, covering sports such as football, athletics, rugby, swimming, tennis and cycling. Some £10m will be spent creating a local league structure for primary and secondary schools. Winning teams will compete in 60 county finals before going on to a national final.

Excellent, and about time too. Predictably, the usual suspects are against the idea…

“John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said some schools struggled to provide changing rooms that were “fit for purpose and sensitive to issues relating to ethnic groups”.

You really couldn’t make it up…

He added: “If funding reduces in the future, schools are likely to have to cut back on sports coaches and others who help with school sport.

“Likewise, some schools will find it a challenge to participate in the ‘school Olympics’. ”

What a shocking attitude, especially in the light of the following:

“Fewer than a third of school pupils take part in regular competitive sport within schools, and fewer than one-in-five take part in regular competition between schools. The School Olympics give us a chance to change that for good.”

I can’t see the downside myself. Life is competitive, there are winners and losers. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

Is it any wonder that we’re so crap at most major sports (aside from rugby, hardly the preserve of your average Comp…) if children go through school unexposed to competitive sports. Or indeed, any wonder that so many of them are so overweight.

It seems a sound scheme to me:

“Schools in England will compete against each other in leagues at a local level from 2011, with winning athletes and teams qualifying for up to 60 county finals.

The most talented young athletes will then be picked for the national finals before the 2012 Olympics.

Schools will also be urged to host in-house Olympic-style sports days so that children of all abilities have the chance to compete. A Paralympic-style element will be included at every level of the competition. ”

The BBC reports, entirely neutrally for once, that:

“The schools competition will be funded by cash from the National Lottery.

Events will involve a wide range of sports including football, rugby, netball, golf, cricket, tennis, athletics, judo, gymnastics, swimming, table tennis, cycling and volleyball.”

and the Sun in a typically content-free report says that “Rowing gold medallist James Cracknell, former England rugby star Jason Leonard, and Sun columnist and Arsenal legend Ian Wright, are among those supporting the sports competition for schools.”

I suppose we shall have to wait for tomorrow’s Grauniad for the left-wing drivel rubbishing this laudable idea…

Ah! I see that the Daily Mail has run a story on this online:

“They will reverse a decline in competitive sport brought about by Left-wing councils that scorned it as ‘elitist’ and insisted on politically correct activities with no winners or losers. “

“Ministers hope the initiative will finally end a culture that has seen schools refuse to pit youngsters directly against each other.

In one directive to schools during the last Labour government, schools were encouraged to replace competitive races with ‘problem-solving’ exercises for their sports days.

Teams were also encouraged to perform tasks in rotation rather than compete directly with each other.

A series of Labour initiatives aimed at reviving competitive sport were undermined by the continued sell-off of school playing fields.”

Quite…