Training.
Not the least important thing about football is the matter of training,
and nearly every professional club has a trainer, whose business it is
not only to get the men fit, but also to keep them so for eight months.
I have spoken to a great many whose work it is to get their men into
condition and keep them so, and I find that a great many of them have
different methods, but nearly all are agreed that every individual must
be taken by himself. The majority of people, however, are not paid
players, although, as I have already said, these are largely increasing
in number, because year by year we see fresh clubs springing up, besides
which every member of an ordinary club should be bound to turn out in as
perfect a condition as possible. Many make a practice of walking to and
from their work, and this in itself is excellent. When Montague
Holbein was training for his Channel swims he used to make a practice of
walking from Catford to the City, and also back, a distance of several
miles, and this he found very valuable indeed. In the early days of some
of the more important clubs a great many of the players who were
professionals went to their ordinary occupations all the week and used
to play on a Saturday. When West Bromwich Albion, captained by William
Bassett, won the English Cup against Preston North End twenty years ago,
the Midlanders were all local lads, whose wages totalled about ten
pounds a week, while Preston's pay-list was four times as much. Indeed,
men who are regularly at work, especially if it be out of doors and if
it taxes one's bodily powers, need very little training. No one ought to
play football unless he has a sound constitution, and every organ in the
body must be sound, especially the heart and lungs; it is a game for
those who are healthy and vigorous. A good plan is to pursue some
exercise during the "close" season, _i.e._, the summer months.
Professionals will tell you that August is their hardest month, a large
number of them having done nothing since the end of April. Their muscles
have become stiff, and they have probably too much surplus flesh. It is
very different where professionals take up first class cricket, and
trainers have frequently told me that those professionals and amateurs
who play the summer game require little or no preparation, and there are
many instances of that. Take, for instance, J. Sharp, the famous
Everton forward. He must be getting on in years, and yet season after
season he plays cricket up till the end of August and then turns up at
Goodison Park and shows how well he can carry the ball along and whip it
into goal, like "a rocket, though not so straight up," as one great
judge has written of him. He has been an International this year. He has
done splendid work as a cricketer, and is second on the list of
Lancashire averages, and may be described as one of the greatest
all-round men in England. Now, in his thirty-first year, he has given
evidence that if you keep in condition there is no need to worry about
special preparation or anything of the sort. Another instance is E.
Needham, the captain of Sheffield United, and perhaps the greatest
half-back for many years that we have had. He is now thirty-five, and it
is a long time since he played his first International match, and long
before he was a cricketer he had made his name as a footballer. He is a
tireless worker, as anyone who has watched him with the Sheffield United
club knows quite well, and long before his age many men have retired
from the game. He has the respect and admiration of everyone, and this
year he has come to the front as a cricketer and finished at the head of
the Derbyshire averages. The result of his always keeping in condition
is that he will probably go on for some years as a great cricketer, and
as one career is on the wane the other seems to be beginning. He is
great indeed at both games. Two other members of the Sheffield United
club have also made their presence felt at the summer game. I refer to
the two half-backs, the brothers Wilkinson. W. H., the half-back, has
never done better as a cricketer. He is a left-handed batsman, and has
made a great advance on anything he has done before, while B. Wilkinson
is a player of some repute. Lewis, of Somerset; Makepeace, of
Lancashire; Ducat, of Surrey; Iremonger, of Notts; and Leach and
Vincett, of Sussex, are all cricketers who have done splendid work
during the summer game, and have turned out footballers perfectly fit at
the beginning of the season. Indeed, if you play cricket as it should be
played it is magnificent training for football. It is hard work getting
fit at the start of the season if you have allowed your muscles to
become flabby, while there may be no regular circulation of the blood,
and generally the muscles that you require are very lethargic, so the
difficulty is with those who do not play tennis or cricket, or go in for
rowing or swimming or some other form of active exercise during the
summer, that they will have to take up some serious practice. Skipping
is good, walking and running, especially short sprinting, while
punch-ball exercise and dumb-bells may be used. There should be
moderation in all things, and one must start carefully at first and
increase the amount of training until one feels fit. During the season
walking and some practice at kicking, with an occasional sprint, are
quite enough to keep the player well. It is quite possible that some may
suffer from the tremendous amount of energy that they put into their
game. I do not think that those who work indoors, such as clerks and
others who are called upon to follow indoor occupation, require more
than moderate regular exercise. It is very likely that they will have to
do their training after or before business hours, and in the evening
brisk walking of a couple of miles, with a sprint of 100 yards four or
five times, is a good way of getting rid of superfluous fat, and
everyone can do this if he likes, though laziness will often lead some
to shield themselves under the excuse, "They have no time." One
well-known forward, thoroughly conscientious in his training, used to
exercise on the Embankment, an excellent plan. Everyone who has to work
sitting down should take a morning bath and a little practice with a
skipping rope or dumb-bells. The question of diet is of some importance.
The game is so strenuous and exhausting that a substantial meal should
be taken at least two hours before a match. Many have a beef steak well
cooked, with stale bread and vegetables that are well done, always
excluding potatoes, and they are able to play right through the game
without feeling in any way fatigued. The plainer the food the better.
All players are better if they leave alone intoxicants. Needham
earnestly advises young players to abstain from them. He says that his
experience is that they do not sustain any long continued effort, and
their stimulating effect is followed by an invariable depression. From
my own observation of players who have abstained and those who have not,
I am sure the former have done far better than the latter. Plenty of
Internationals and men whose names are household words are total
abstainers. I remember Vivian J. Woodward at a dinner in the football
season would neither touch intoxicating drinks nor smoke, and England's
captain knew what he was about. Kirwan, who captained Ireland; John
Goodall, one of the props of the game; John Lewis, the famous penalty
king; C. Williams, the Brentford and Tottenham goalkeeper; Ducat, of
Woolwich Arsenal, are only a few of the total abstainers, and to them I
might add R. M. Hawkes, International and the Luton captain. Indeed, if
you want to be of the greatest value to your side you may take it from
me that you will do better service by leaving alone all sorts of
alcohol, and as to smoking, I am quite sure it is thoroughly bad. I see
one picture which explains to me why a great deal of the slackness is
creeping over our boys. Again and again I have watched mere lads of
fourteen and fifteen, as well as young men of twenty-five, come on to
the cricket and football field smoking those horrible, cheap, inferior
"fags." How any captain can allow it is a great mystery to me, because
if we are training for a match we always say do not smoke a day or two
before, because it interferes with one's staying powers. Yet I have seen
boys come down to Tottenham smoking all the way from London, all the
time they are changing, and actually come from the dressing room with
cigarettes, and blow and blow away right to the moment of kicking off.
Not content with that, they get through some more cigarettes at the
interval, and then wonder why they are tired before the match is over. I
have often begged of our youths if they wish to be athletes to remember
that it means a certain amount of self-denial, and if they want to do
their best for their side they will take this matter seriously to heart
and remember that smoking and drinking intoxicants make one unfit rather
than otherwise. I do not think that the ordinary player need think about
special training, but if, on the other hand, staleness comes to him a
complete rest is necessary. When you are overworked at the end of a long
season your feet will seem heavy and your kicking will be uncertain,
while you will fall and stumble about. This is the time to retire and
make room for someone else. With a little care you will gain the
necessary freshness, and you will be able to tell when you have got
that, because you will be anxious to play the game.
[Illustration: CENTRING FROM THE LEFT WING.]