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MUTTONERS AND GOLDEN FERRETS

Sport

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Sport is sweetest when

there be no lookers on

(1616)

Sport has always been a part of British national life. In the beginning were the informal games that anyone could play anywhere:

way-zaltin (Somerset) a game in which two persons standing back to back interlace each other’s arms and by bending forward alternately raise each other from the ground

hot cockles (1580) a rustic game in which one player lay face downwards, or knelt down with his eyes covered, and being struck by the others in turn, guessed who struck him

hinch-pinch (1603) a game where one person hits another softly, then the other player hits back with a little more force, and each subsequent blow in turn is harder, until it becomes a real fight

IN TOUCH

Many of our best-known sports started life in similar fashion. The earliest games of football involved one village taking on another, in violent, daylong combats where broken legs and bruised heads were common. Current slang reveals that underneath, perhaps, little has changed:

blaggudy (Wales) rough, dirty (especially of a football or rugby team)

clogger (UK slang 1970) a soccer player who regularly injures other players

sprig-stomping (New Zealand 1993) the deliberate stamping with studded boots on a recumbent rugby opponent

falling leaf a long-range shot in football which sees the ball change direction radically in the course of its flight

spaghetti-legs routine a goalkeeper’s trick employed to distract a penalty taker

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SECONDS AWAY

Another of our oldest sports had similar rough-and-tumble beginnings:

clow (Winchester 19C) a box on the ear

glass jaw (US slang 1940) of a boxer with an inability to withstand a punch to the chin

haymaker (1912) an unrestrained punch usually leading to a knockout, whereby the fist is swung wide in an arc

claret christening (b.1923) the first blood that flows in a boxing match

waterboy (US police slang 1930s) a boxer who can be bribed or coerced into losing for gambling purposes

FROM LAND’S END TO BROADWAY

Wrestling, too, has become less violent and more theatrical over the years, with a terminology that dates back to its origins, supplemented by more recent slang from around the world…

falx (Tudor–Stuart) a grip round the small of the back

Cornish hug a hug that causes one to be thrown over (Cornish men were famous wrestlers)

sugarbagging the tossing of an opponent onto the canvas as if he were a bag of sugar

whizzer an arm lock trapping one’s arm against the opponent’s body from a position behind him

potato (US slang 1990) a real hit that injures, as opposed to an orchestrated, harmless one

jobber a wrestler whose primary function is losing to better-known wrestlers

broadway a drawn result (so-called because, ideally, the result makes both men bigger stars)

OVER AND OUT

Another quintessentially English game has a host of extraordinary terms, from the yorker (a ball pitched directly at the batsman’s feet) to silly mid-off (a fielding position close to and in front of the batsman). Other words have fallen out of fashion:

muttoner (Winchester College 1831) a blow from a cricket ball on the knuckles, the bat being at the time clasped by them

slobber (1851) to fail to grasp the cricket ball cleanly in fielding

bowl a gallon (Eton College c.1860) to get a hat-trick (the bowler then earned a gallon of beer)

TO THE 19TH

For the more senior sportsman, another gentler but equally demanding game with British (well Scottish, strictly) roots has been successfully exported around the world. First comes the teeing off, with all the problems that that entails:

waggle pre-stroke trial movements

sclaffing skidding the club over the grass before it hits the ball

whiff a stroke that misses the ball

skull to hit the ball too far above its centre

shank to hit the ball with the neck of the club

then the slow or fast progression down the fairway:

chilli-dip a weak, lofted shot that follows a mis-hit that has managed to hit more ground than ball (from the image of taking a taco and scooping up a helping of chilli)

fried egg a ball lying embedded in sand

golden ferret a golf stroke where the ball is holed from a bunker

mulligan a free extra shot sometimes taken as a second chance in a social match to a player who has made a bad one, not counted on his score-card

before the triumphant arrival at the green:

frog hair the well-cut grass that divides the fairway from the green itself and is of a length and smoothness somewhere between the two

steamy a short shot or a putt that passes over or through the green

stiff a shot that stops so close to the hole that it must be impossible to miss the putt

TOUCHÉ

Fencing, by contrast to all of the above, originated on the Continent and so has a language with a very European feel:

mandritta (Tudor–Stuart 1595) a cut from right to left

passado (Shakespeare: Love’s Labour’s Lost 1588) a motion forwards and a thrust

volt (1692) to leap with both feet in the air by your opponent’s left shoulder

appel a tap or stamp of the foot, serving as a warning of one’s intent to attack

derobement an evasion of the opponent’s attempt to take or beat the blade while keeping the sword arm straight and threatening the opponent

TOUR DE FRANCE

Since their invention in France in 1860, bicycles have been eagerly embraced by our Gallic neighbours. So it’s hardly surprising that cycling is a sport with a French-derived argot:

musette a small cotton shoulder bag containing food that’s handed to riders during a race

domestique a member of a professional cycling team, whose job is to ride solely for the benefit of the team and team leader, instead of their own glory

lanterne rouge the overall last-place rider in a stage race (from the red light found on the back of a train)

But as soon as things start going wrong, we’re back to good old English:

bonk a cyclist’s feeling of being devoid of energy

sag wagon the vehicle that carries bicyclists that have withdrawn from the event (due to injury, bicycle malfunction, tiredness etc.)

HEY DUDE!

Surfers follow the waves; and though you can find something to ride on in Newquay, they’re altogether bigger, better and harder to stay on in Big Sur and Bondi…

shark biscuit (Australian slang c.1910) a novice surfer

hang five (US 1960s) to ride with the toes of one foot hooked over the front of the board

knots the bruises and cuts gained from battling the waves and his board (a surfer’s status mark)

grubbing falling off your board while surfing

frube a surfer who does not catch a wave for the whole time they are in the water

hodad (1962) a show-off who hangs around surfing beaches, boasting of his exploits and trying to pick up girls, who has rarely, if ever, tried to surf

cowabunga! (Australian slang 1954) a shout of elation on surfing down a superb wave

COLORADO CLIFFHANGER

Climbing terms, likewise, come from mountainous places:

gingich (Scotland 1716) the chief climber or leader in climbing rocks

flash (Canada 1995) to climb a wall successfully on the first try

dynoing (Colorado 1992) leaping to a distant or out-of-reach hand hold

hang-dogging (Colorado 1992) a derogatory term for inexperienced climbers who hang on the rope while attempting feats beyond their ability

TROLLING AND YUMPING

Every sport, indeed, has both specialized terminology and also the kind of insiders’ slang that makes seasoned practitioners feel quietly different, whether that be…

Rowing…

gully-shooting (b.1891) pointing oars upwards when rowing

gimp seat seat number 3 in an eight-person boat (often regarded as having the least responsibility)

blip-o! (late 19C) a derisive cry at a boat’s coxswain colliding with anything

Tennis…

ketchepillar (early 16C) a tennis player

nacket (1833) a tennis ball-boy

Gymnastics…

coffee grinder a manoeuvre from a squatting position on the floor involving a circle of the leg while keeping both hands on the floor

fliffis a twisting double somersault performed on the trampoline

fly-away a horizontal-bar dismount method with a backward somersault

Billiards…

feather to run the cue backwards and forwards across the bridge between finger and thumb prior to making a shot

english the spin imparted to the ball

cocked hat a shot in which the ball hit by the white rebounds off three different cushions towards a middle pocket

or any of the other ways active people have found to pass their time, from long ago…

cock-squailing an old Shrove Tuesday sport involving flinging sticks at a cock tied by the leg, one penny per throw and whoever kills him takes him away

strag (Lancashire) to decoy other people’s pigeons

trolling (Yorkshire) rolling hardboiled eggs down a slope (on Easter Monday)

dwile flunking (Suffolk) floorcloth throwing (a serious, competitive game)

postman’s knock (Oxfordshire) a method of sliding on ice (by moving on one foot and tapping the ice with the other)

to right now…

to do an Ollie (skateboarding) to flip your ride in the air and stay aloft upon it

yump (rally-driving) to leave the ground in one’s vehicle when going over a ridge

sandbagging (motorcycle racing) a stratagem whereby the favourite lets the rest of the field go on ahead, confident that when necessary he can regain the lead and win the race as expected

bulldogging (rodeo) to leap off a horse and then wrestle with a steer (the intention being to twist it by the horns and force it over onto the ground)

zorbing (New Zealand) harnessing oneself inside a huge inflatable PVC ball, then rolling more than 650 feet downhill

WORD JOURNEYS

upshot (16C) the final shot in archery that decided a match

racket (16C from Arabic via French) the palm of the hand

umpire (15C from Latin: non par, via Old French) not equal

gymnasium (16C from Ancient Greek via Latin) a school for exercising in the nude

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