It's only in retrospect that I've realised how prevalent sport is within the A Song in a Strange Land. I've not yet ascertained what can be inferred from that. I don't think it would be an exaggeration to say that if I pointed out the greater significance that sport can play in life, that a million people would have preceded me in doing so. It can be an arena to play out our tribal battles, to live vicariously through our sporting heroes, as a basis of inspiration for our own sporting endeavours.
Linton, my elder brother, upon whom Andre is based, was a talented middle distance runner who used to compete for Scunthorpe Harriers Athletics Club on a county and regional basis. For much of my own life I thought myself ill suited to many sports in comparison to my peers, but then found I appeared to have disproportionate strength relative to my height and weight, and came to realise that that made me suited to some fields of sporting endeavour. Almost invariably, I have regarded the role sport has played in my life as a good thing, given that it teaches you self discipline, gives you confidence, and can be a positive controlled outlet for your energies. True, it can be said that during the period in which I was boxing, I used my skills to negative ends, but that was my lack of self discipline at that time of my life, not the fault of the sport.
I went on to win several county and regional weightlifting championships - powerlifting to be precise - and all in all I regard it as a positive part of my life. Once, in my very early twenties when I worked for the Ministry of Defence at Chilwell near Nottingham, a bodybuilder challenged me to an impromptu contest, quite some time after I had finished competing. The challenge was to lift one of those 56lb weights (of the type you sometimes see used to weigh potatoes, etc.) one handed above head, arm extended, elbow locked. The whole depot gathered round to watch, and no doubt gamble a little. I lifted the weight forty times, he did so fourteen. Given that he was about one-and-a-half times my size, his friends ribbed him about the loss, to which his reply was, "Well, what did you expect? He had God on his side." Indeed.
On the basis of that spectacle, a former world champion, Jack Coffey, wanted to train me as a boxer. After initially agreeing, I later decided that boxing would take me back to a place in my life I should not go back to. To be clear, it is not at all that I believe that no Christians should box, I simply believed that this particular Christian shouldn't. No matter what the sport, everyone makes an assessment of the extent to which the endeavour is destructive, and this varies from person to person.
I re-engaged in weightlifting later in life, in my thirties, but the scene had changed considerably with the proliferation of banned substances such as steroids and human growth hormones, prompting me to observe wryly at the time that if the object of the exercise was to win by artificial means, you may as well employ a fork-lift truck.
Sporting events no doubt carry all manner of significance, often as much if not more to the watcher than to the participant, but I'm by no means sure on each occasion what that significance is.
Sporting events outlined in A Song in a Strange Land
Ali vs Foreman - The Rumble in the Jungle
Kinshasa, Zaire, October 1974. Practically no one gave Ali a chance in this fight. Many people, myself included, worried he might get killed, such was George Foreman's punching power and ferocious reputation. The same, however, could be said for when Ali faced Sonny Liston a decade earlier.
Ali transcended sport, having gained prominence shortly before the assassinations of MLK Jnr and Malcolm X. The faith he espoused is not one I share, but it's almost impossible for me not to admire him as a man, given the stance he took against the draft and the sacrifices he was prepared to make. As I was approaching adulthood, however, he was approaching a slow sporting and personal decline, begging the question, what happens when the person or people you admire most in the world decline, when their fallibility becomes exposed, just as your own may do?
Ali vs Foreman - The Rumble in the Jungle - 30 Oct 1974
England vs West Indies - "We'll make them grovel" - 22 July 1976
This was the first cricket test match I ever attended. We were treated to a West Indies first innings of 450, and the fall of two England wickets. The thorny issue arose later in the 1990 as to which team immigrants and their children supported. We unapologetically supported the West Indies, who were on the cusp of their glory days. Their team included the openers Gordon Greenidge and Roy Fredericks, both of whom scored centuries, a quick-fire 66 by the great Viv Richards, and a half-century by Lawrence Rowe.
Their motivation, should they need it, came from the England captain, Tony Greig, an apartheid era South African who infamously stated that he would make the West Indies team grovel. Clive Lloyd's team included Michael Holding, Andy Roberts and Wayne Daniels, some of the greatest ever fast bowlers, were not about to grovel. Quite the opposite.
England vs West Indies - Headingley - 22nd July 1976
Man Utd 3 WBA 5 - "The Three Degrees" - Old Trafford - 30th December 1978
My brother Linton and I demonstrated a lack of planning which landed us in the Stretford End of Old Trafford directly behind the goal amongst the Manchester United fans, who had a fearsome reputation of their own. We even conversed with their supporters who never thought to suspect us, because we sounded far more like northerners than midlanders, and also because we'd concealed our West Brom scarves. When each of the eight goals were scored, our responses clearly didn't draw attention to ourselves, prompting me to observe in the book that extreme elation and extreme sorrow can appear indistinguishable at times.
Brendon Batson, Laurie Cunningham and big Cyrille Regis - the three degrees as they became known. Not unlike our visits to the Old Showground, there was no shortage of racial abuse directed towards them, but they and their team answered that in the best way possible, by excelling. Sadly, both Laurie Cunningham and Cyrille Regis died prematurely, but their moments of sporting glory are captured for posterity. It was a wonderful experience and a great, albeit fleeting, day.
Manchester United 3 West Bromwich Albion 5 - "The Three Degrees" - 30th December 1978