I wonder what it would be like to exclude sport completely from one’s life for, say, one year? No playing sport, no watching it, no reading it no discussing it no thinking about it even.
It would certainly be very strange. Ever since I can remember I’ve been fascinated by sport in all its guises. Games are in my bloodstream. My father played first-class hockey, tennis, cricket and football in Trinidad. A great-uncle on my mother’s side long ago captained Trinidad and played for the West Indies (in 1906) at cricket. An uncle on my father’s side was a yachtsman and captained Great Britain in the 1948 Olympics. I was trying out leg breaks in the back garden and hitting tennis balls against a wall long before I was 10 years old. I’ve spent more happy hours than I can count playing games and watching every sport under the sun. But still despite all that, think of the time that would open up for other things if one excluded sport utterly from one’s life. After all I’ve met persons of fascinating character and wide range of interests who have known literally nothing about sport, absolutely nothing – people who stare blankly at you if you mention even Sobers or Pele or Tiger Woods (although perhaps the name Muhammad Ali does bring a blink of recognition), people who haven’t the slightest idea what an over is or who ran the