Like many others I did my best to fall out of the back window picturing the 'Red Moon.' Of course it was too low on the horizon, to bathed in cloud, and not possible for my wee camera to picture. I therefore was glad to have obtained this pic the night before, a bit faint, but this moon was quite far away from my window.
Without the expensive camera and lenses required, and also in a country plagued with cloud, it is difficult to get better pictures of the heavens above us. Being wealthy I could move to Hawaii and climb a dead volcano on a cloudless night and obtain clear shots, but in truth travelling as far as Tesco is more than enough at the moment.
I was interested by Tm Davies comment (Tim Davie the Director General of the BBC) regarding Nigel Farage wearing a 'GBNews' badge while 'testifying' in the USA the other day. Apart from the fact that the US Senator tore Nigel apart and called him what he is the wearing of badges from media stations supporting you is against the Media Law. No MP, and he is laughingly an MP for Clacton where he never visits, no MP can advertise or be paid for in this manner. Some have complained, but whether the proper authorities take action we shall see, much later. Anyway, Tim Davies comment that 'It does not matter,' gives an indication of how the BBC is running a pro Farage operation. Davie, who once stood as a Tory candidate, has allowed the BBC to push Farage and Reform constantly on TV and Radio. With the majority of the UK accepting blindly what is offered on the national news it gives Farage and Reform an unfair advantage. BBC Scotland however, continues to pretend the SNP do not exist and only offer the feeble Scottish Labour leader and little bar grumbles about the SNP. This is what happens when England rules the airwaves.
The press otherwise have said nothing regarding Farage's tax dodging and brought out old complaints re Boris Johnson being on the make. No surprise there. Some space given over to Israel attacking Hamas HQ in Qatar, much space to the UK Ambassador to the USA Peter Mandelson calling Jeffrey Epstein a 'friend,' though what Peter would do with young females I could not hazard a guess. While some space is given to riots in Nepal, I suppose burning down parliament can be called a riot, some space has been given to the 'race' for the deputy leadership of the Labour Party. Labour is now completely in the hands of the Conservative faction, wealthy men doing their Thatcher like best to avoid taxes and let the peasants pay. The election has been curbed into a few days to stop the masses of the party making clear their favourite and so Starmer will have his way. Or should we say Morgan McSweeney will have his way. Now there is a man who ought to be investigated by the media. But note how that does not happen?
Andy Mitchell's book concerns the birth of International football, not the birth of football as we know it today. That as you know began in Scotland many years ago, in fact James I (or was it James IV?) banned 'the playing of the futeball,' and demanded the men concentrated on the archery instead. Clearly he had no talent for the game to show.
In the London area we know football was played according to many differing rules. Eventually some began to organise teams playing the same rules, and not a variety according to taste. These however differed from the laws of the game developed in Scotland, and the Laws in London differed from other places with football such as Sheffield and Wales.
Anyway, the toffs from the public schools always had time to play football, whatever rules they used. They had money, they did not have to work 98 hours a week to earn a pittance, and in school and university games were considered as important as learning, which often had a heavy leaning on 'Classics.'
With the organisation of the English Football Association in 1863, where the first argument concerned the right to 'Hack an opponent,' which was turned down and this led to the creation of Rugby. Some would say 'Hacking' has not disappeared from the English game even today of course. Games were now organised, though team loyalties not so strong, and eventually a Scotch v England game arose.
Several unofficial 'internationals' took place, sometimes with players who's origins were dubious, and occasionally played in full internationals for the other side!
By 1872 the first true international took place on the West of Scotland cricket ground in Glasgow. This tussle of mighty men barging one another, the English depending on one man dribbling through the enemy, the Scotch using the beginning of the 'passing game,' ended in no scoring draw. There was no more non scoring draws until 1970, 98 years later. Typical, I was there!
This book begins with the personal involved, the toffs from the public schools, interestingly the 1872 Scotch team had non public schools players, the England side did not, and for some time. The people on both sides, including the rugby breakaways who played an international before the football side, their background and at the end of the book, a short pen history of their life and sometimes interesting deaths.
Written with an English bias by a man with great Scottish football history, he often writes in the 'Scottish Sporting History,' mag, and his book is well worth a read for the beginning of the international game.
Note the entrance price, one shilling, in 1878!
They did not wish the common man to attend, did they?
