MY FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF RUGBY FOOTBALL
(1956)

My first impressions of rugby football were that it was a nasty, dangerous game and I hoped that I should not have to play it. At first I was afraid that I should be hurt doing those dive tackles who knows I might even be kicked in the teeth or I might end up performing a three-point landing on my nose, chin and forehead (horrible thought)! And those scrums! I felt it must be dreadful to have my head squashed between-ah-hem and then some clever person, after I had been pushed over from the back, mistook my head for the ball (very painful !). And then the place kick-well I mean to say - you are holding the ball very obligingly just above the ground when someone has to come along and kick it from you (as ill-mannered as snatching) but, worse still, he probably misses the ball and you are seen in the Doctor's surgery later by one of your friends (perhaps the one who kicked the ball) who asks you how on earth you come to have your arm in a sling. There is a consolation - one cannot write with a broken wrist.

I now sympathise with the old lady who, when watching a scrum, remarked that the numbers were in the wrong place.

There are fifteen men to a side (usually men or boys) and the object is either to get the ball over the crossbar of the goal post, or to touch it down over the goal-line - a comparatively simple matter in theory with fifteen players using both hands and feet - in soccer, eleven players manage quite well using only their feet!

But rugby football is really quite fun; one can usually get off fairly lightly with a broken nose, arm, ribs and a lovely black eye!

P. A. WALLIS (IA)