Auld Greys - Walking rugby

from Kendal vs Macclesfield Programme

Kendal Youth Round Up .cont

There’s no i in team but there is a u in nuts

Do you ever wonder what it must be like to live in the public eye, to have every action examined and discussed by the world’s media? Going out becomes like being a goldfish in a bowl and a trip to the shops takes forever because of the hordes who all want a picture of you. They gurn idiotically and if you don’t smile, they post the picture and complain how miserable you are. Imagine. Recently, I have been drinking from the chalice of fame. It started when I was chosen to receive the Ginna, our weekly trophy at the Auld Greys’ session on a Wednesday. Then I was asked to pin up some promotional cards for the AGs on Sainsbury’s noticeboard. There I am, along with Ivan and Ruth, beaming out from amongst the adverts for charity whist drives and dog walking services. The real spotlight moment came when an email arrived from Sainsbury’s analysing my purchases over the last year. Ladies and gentlemen, I am the no 1 buyer of Just Snax peanuts in Kendal. Let that sink in. Number 1! They tell me I am Boss of the Basket. I have arrived. Anyone know a good PR agency?

I don’t fancy a life in the spotlight and would agree with that bloke who wrote that no man (or woman) is an island and each of us needs others around us. That is surely one of the attractions of team sports. Each of us has played with someone who never really does it for the team but considers themselves bigger, better, or more important than the rest. But when we look back on our own sporting successes is it not the team achievements that stand out most? The camaraderie and laughter, shared effort, and graft? Likewise, in whatever work we did or do isn’t success sweeter and more savoured when it is a group effort? On the other hand, failure endured alone is so much harder to suffer than when the burden can be shared with others in the same boat.

The attractions of the Auld Greys are numerous. The f word is prominent in any list of our motivations and is at the heart of every session. By f word I could mean fitness, fun, fulfilment, or friendship. However, I wish to focus upon a t word that is of great relevance to our band of brothers and sisters. It is teamwork. Many of our membership have played team sports in the past but as one ages like a fine wine or goes flat like a discarded Party Seven, team sports are often replaced by solo pursuits (no-not that one!) Walking rugby allows us to take part as a member of a team again. Each week a group of us comes together, encouraging and coaching and easing the burden as we hurl a ball around. Each week a group of us is thrown together by merit of the colour of a training bib in the pursuit of one goal. There are moves, there are switches, there is laughter and most of all there is support for one another. There is that lovely feeling of being a part of something a little bigger.

Recently we welcomed some students from Kendal College to two of our sessions. They mixed in with us unsure of what they would find. Our ages range from 58ish to 82ish. Theirs from 16ish to 18ish. Within minutes their preconceptions were rubbished. They saw that we worked as teams, we knew the rules, we helped and encouraged each other. By the second of the four round robin games we played they were properly mucking in -joining in with the laughter and seeking clarity on the best way forward or to better understand the rules of this strange game we love. The desire of them as individuals to score a try had been replaced by the desire to help their team score a try and quickly, they even got the message that keeping score isn’t important. It’s the craic, its’s the fun, it’s the taking part. If you come along, you will have the same warm welcome. I guarantee it!

I was once challenged by a very bright kid I taught. ‘You keep saying it’s not rocket science. Well, what is rocket science? I’m not sure, but I know that looking out for friends and working as a team certainly isn’t.

Yours until I am overthrown as Boss of the Basket

Pete Halsall

Great philosophy and an enjoyable article - Richard

In the Past (2)

This was originally planned for the Kirkby programme, but I decided two pieces in a row on the past may be too much.

When she rang me on Christmas Day, my sister asked if I was doing anything exciting. I said probably not to anyone else, but compiling the 1905 to 1949 Kendal Rugby Club statistics was to me. With the enforced longer break, and the prospect of bad weather (although it was not too bad this year – apart from the afternoon when the Social team were playing), I try to have a “plan” of things “to do” over the Christmas/New Year break. However, the one thing I can normally be sure of is anything on that list are the ones that won’t get done, and I will be doing something totally different instead. This time was different, as the pre-1950 stats were what I had set out to do, and did.

The real “excitement” (well at least “interest”) came two days later when having updated information for each season, I started adding the information for the full period. I had not realised until I started do this, how little I had previously entered for this period. Players’ names were already there, but most scoring and appearance details (the latter still being far from complete) had yet to be entered, despite much of it having been found during pre-pandemic visits to the Archive Centre in Kendal, from lists compiled by others at the time. As previously mentioned, the figures do not always agree, so what I had been doing on Christmas Day was trying to sort out the differences, where the scorers from match reports did not match the end of season summary total in the archives lists, before moving to the next step. The way it works is fairly convoluted. First as I check each season in old copies of the Gazette on microfilm in Kendal library I add the details game by game to a spreadsheet for each season. Once that is complete, (or rather I have added as much as I can find), that information later gets put into a table of players appearances and scores for each season. Then as the original sheet from 1905 to date got too big, it is now split into three blocks, which fitted with quality of the original information; nonexistent pre-1950; almost complete post-1999; variable in the intervening years. So, I add the information from the season’s sheet onto the fifty year sheet which gives most players career details. Finally (the one I did at New Year, but rarely gets done) is a summary of the three blocks combined, so I can compare the records of all players since 1905, and also those players like Billy Coxon, Richard Harryman and Liam Hayton, plus those of the 1940s and 1950s, who have played in two of the blocks. As I started adding the figures for the highly successful mid-1930s it became clear there were at least two more players who had beaten Chris Park to the 1,000 point mark. However, the player capped by England whilst at the club, and the captain of team which went unbeaten for a very long period in the 1930s, are not bad company to be in. Also, in the seasons between 1928 and 1937 the team were scoring an average of 140 tries a season (178 in 1929/30), which made passing records a bit easier, (last season’s 103 tries was the third best since 2000), Despite tries being only 3 points (drop goals were 4) Sam Martindale had 1,142 points from 63 tries, 365 conversions, 73 penalties and 1 drop goal (there are more to come), whilst Alec Johnson’a 1,201 points came from 275 tries, 100 conversions, 73 penalties and 14 drop goals. As they played together kicking was shared, whilst others also took some. As previously mentioned kicking was not so easy in those days with in the 1928 to 1937 period just 38% of tries being converted, whilst Chris and Glen managed 72% last season.

Whilst the appearance figures pre-1950 still have a lot to be added, due to the work of others in the distant past, the scoring records are starting to look good. From the launch of the current club in 1905 until 1913, when play was suspended for the First World War, only 2 points in 2,500 are not listed to a player (occasionally it is Mr AN Other, as the match reporter didn’t include a player’s name or there are two players with the same surname, but the report only mentions a surname). Details were

In the Past (2) .cont

missing for the 1923/4 and 1924/5 seasons, (I started filling these gaps from the old Gazettes on the morning of the Kirkby game, and hopefully will have completed more before today’s game), but apart from them, from 1919, when play resumed, until 1938, there are under 100 points missing in over 7,800 scored. A bit of work to do 1938 to 1949, but from Gazette reports I already have found 675 of the 679 scored in 1947/48, 280 of the 361 in 1948/49 and 356 of 371 in 1949/50.

So still a chance others may join Sam, Alec, Chris, David Bell and Keith Ridding.

However, before I get to them, Glen Weightman’s name could join them, with just 41 points needed at the time of writing, although with only five League games to go, he may need a few tries or a good run of end of season cup games, if he is to make it this season

FOOTNOTE : A bonus of finding out about Alec Johnson’s scoring feats, was I went back to a newspaper article about him reproduced in the Centenary book, and whilst reading it (with the help of a magnifying glass) I found some extra first names of players from that period. Reports were fairly formal in those days, calling players by their surname or occasionally adding an initial (even sections of the Centenary book do the same). So finding first names is a bonus to me.

I have added the long list of players I have so far found who have represented the club since 1905, into the Season Summary page on the website (link at the foot of the Preview and Report). So if you know some of the names I am missing (some are more recent than the 1920s), I would be pleased to add them

Some players may still be missing, whilst I suspect some were just typos of another player’s names in the Gazette. A few are players from other clubs who made up the numbers when we were short in away games, so will have appeared only once. At the time we occasionally did the same for others when they visited us. When this happened, I make a note on the spreadsheet, and also add extra details when I find them, like where players came from, or went on to, when they were injured or playing for the County. One of the 1923/24 players was described as the “son of the Vicar of Burneside”).

Mark Hodgkiss

Improved boots and balls has led to more converted tries? -Richard

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