Sport - cricket, football.

SPORT

Sport probably plays a more important part in people’s lives in Britain than it does in most other countries. For a very large number, and this is especially true for men, it is their main form of entertainment. Millions take part in some kind of sport at least once a week. Many millions more are regular spectators and fallow one or more ports. There are hours of televised sport each week. Every newspaper, national or local, quality or popular, devotes several pages entirely to sport.

Cricket
Judging by the numbers of people who play it and watch it, cricket is definitely not sport of Britain. In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, interest in it is largely confined to the middle classes. Only in England and a small part of Wales is it played at top level. And even in England, where its enthusiasts come from all classes, the majority of the population do not understand its rules. Moreover, it is rate for the English national team to be the best in the world.
When people refer to cricket as the English national game, they are not thinking so much of its level of popularity or of the standard of English players but more of the very English associations that it carries with it. Cricket is much more than just a sport, it symbolizes a way of life- a slow and peaceful rural way of life. Cricket is associated with long sunny summer a afternoons, the smell of new- mown grass and the sound of leather connecting with willow. Cricket is special because it combines competition with British dream of rural life. Cricket is what the village green is for! As if to emphasize the rural connection, ‘first class’ cricket teams in England, unlike teams in other sports, do not bear the names of towns but of countries. Cricket is the national English game in a symbolic sense.

Football
British football has traditionally drawn its main following from the working class. In general, the intelligentsia ignored it. But in the last two decades of the twentieth century, it started to attract wider interest. Fanzines are magazines written in an informal but often highly intelligent and witty style, published by the fans of the clubs. One or two books of literary merit have been written which focus not only on players, teams and tactics but also the wider social aspects of the game.
Many team sports in Britain, but especially football, tend to be men-only, ‘tribal’ affairs. Perhaps this is why active support for local teams has had a tendency to become violent. During the 1970s and 1980s football hooliganism was a major problem in England. In the 1990s, however, it seems to be on the decline.
Many stadiums are very old, uncomfortable and sometimes dangerous. Accidents at professional football matches led to the decision to turn the grounds of first division and premiership club into ‘all-seater’ stadiums. Fans can no longer stand, jump, shout and sway on the cheap ‘terraces’ behind the goals. It is assumed that being seated makes fans more well-behaved. It remains to be seen whether this development will turn football matches into events for whole family.