Sporting Aspects
Sheffield Setting
By J. P. W. MALLALIEU SHEFFIELD, they say, is an ugly picture in a beautiful frame. There is no doubt about the frame, at least if you come through the Derbyshire Snake Pass, saddest and most exciting of roads.
Sad ? The streams which twist and sweep through the peat now find themselves dammed into reservoirs, vast stretches of cold, still water brooding the whole valley's length. These waters cover what only a few years ago was farmland—at their edge you can see old stone farmhouses, still inhabited but cut for ever from their source of life; and near the valley's mouth, a whole village is submerged. When Lady Bower was evacuated, the buildings were not demolished; and so, as the dam slowly -filled, the villagers watched their old homes disappear under the impersOnal water until only the church steeple remained to show what once had been. Perhaps the bells of Lady Bower, like those of Lyonnesse, still sound.
Reservoirs or no, the excitement of the Pass endures. The road is so precariously embanked on the steep moorland side that parts of it abandon the struggle and relapse into the waters far below. Always it seems threatened by the rocks which centuries of wind and rain have laid bare of peat, rocks which jut to the sky, rocks which seem only to have paused before resuming their thunderous roll to the valley. Always the road is lit by colours, warm blues and purples in the sun, bright glistening greens and reds after rain, brown and gold under last Saturday's undecided sky. And there is new excite- ment. We stopped for sandwiches at the Snake Inn with its all-pervading smell of the hams which for so long have hung from its beams with its musty decorations and its sign com- - bining the old world with the new—" Albert R. Orio, Pro- prietor, Foreign and British Wines and Spirits, Ale, Porter and Tobacco; Free House, No Dogs, No Rucksacks "—and there we saw new life growing in the pass. For, rising above the waters, up hillsides almost too steep for man, in soil which for centuries has fed nothing but gorse and bracken, planta- tions of Scotch firs were growing, firs which will bind the hillsides against the ravages of future winds and provide new forests• for future generations. The waters have submerged old life in the Pass but new life is rising beyond their reach.
With such a frame any picture would have to be good if it was to show at all. On Saturday the picture was good. But I am talking not of the city of Sheffield but of a foot- ball match in which Sheffield United, last year's champions of the Second Division, played Huddersfield Town, last year's runners-up.
The match was played at Bramall Lane, that narrow, smoke- grimed, red-bricked street which has given its name to the fruitiest cricket ground I know. On that ground, all summer long, people who can play cricket are scrutinised and appraised by people who really can watch it. That Bramall Lane crowd, of course, wants ,to see Yorkshire win; but, even more, it wants to see good cricket. When the cricket is poor, and especially if the Yorkshire cricket is poor, the comments are pithy and penetrating; but if the cricket is good, even if it' comes from a foreigner or from Douglas Jardine who, to Bramall Lane, is a Yorkshireman in disguise, the crowd is full-hearted and delightedly generous. It is enough to say that in autumn and winter, when Sheffield United take the ground over from cricket, the football crowd holds to the ground's high standard. Whether closely packed round three sides of .the playing pitch or thinly sprinkled, with only a long-distance view, on the Pavilion's terraces, they know and acclaim good football whencesoever it comes.
On Saturday they had something worth acclaiming. Before all the ticket holders had settled into or even reached their seats, Huddersfield had scored. The ball was tip-tapped out to Metcalfe on the left wing and Metcalfe at once flung back a long high cross which Glazzard, coming up full tilt, headed into a corner of the net. 0-1. I nearly now wrote that Huddersfield scored again before the cheers for their first goal had had time to die; but the truth is that cheers never did die throughout the game. There was one continuous roar. Anyway after nine minutes, Metcalfe skipped past five men in succession and fired a shot which someone may have been able to see, but not me, nor the Sheffield goalkeeper.
Stimulated by this, the sometimes leisurely Metcalfe went at it again. He sent in another blinder from the left and, though the goalie saw this on and flung himself full length, he could only parry it and the ball bounced on towards Gunn on the Huddersfield right wing. He promptly shot again, hit the inside of the post, and the ball, skidding across the Sheffield goal, landed by luck in the clutching hands of the still prostrate goalie. At this my nephew glanced at the cricket score board and said: " They'll need that before the end."
I told him to shut his mouth but it was too late. Within thirty seconds, Sheffield had scored. A Sheffield forward followed a long ball up the ground and, tiring of waiting for two Huddersfield defenders to end their " After you •Claude. No, after you Cecil " civilities, neatly popped it in the net. It could so easily have been 0-3 and a runaway victory in sight, but instead it was 1-2 and Sheffield United on fire. Twice the Huddersfield goalkeeper saved only by risking death at the feet of Sheffield's onrushing forwards and though, in a brilliant breakaway, Huddersfield suddenly scored again, it was Sheffield who were on top and just before half time they had made it 2-3.
Some ten minutes after the restart it was 3-3 and Mills in the Huddersfield goal, was still flinging himself regardless of life. Huddersfield held out by the skin on Mills' finger-tips and slowly, imperceptibly, the game began to swing again until at last Glazzard met a high centre and somehow hooked it over his own shoulder. The Sheffield goalkeeper back- somersaulted in his effort to save but, as he lay flat and injured, he saw the ball in the net. 3-4. Soon it was 3-5, for Metcalfe put in a low fast shot for which the injured goalie could not bend. It became 3-6 just before the end when the Sheffield centre-forward, who had taken over in goal, forgot that for once he could use his hands.
So there it ended, unhappy in the one injury, but happy in everything else. The game was tensely exciting yet full of fun. Once, when the Sheffield centre-forward was whistled offside when clean away, he gathered the ball like a rugger player, swerved past the goalkeeper and hurled the ball into the net with a broad grin on his face. Once a forward made a brilliant run and then at a critical moment completely missed his kick. He laughed and so did everyone else. What .a joy it was to see brilliant football combined with fun, to see players and spectators at one in exciting enjoyment, what a . privilege to be part of that crowd and to see such football 1 The football was so good that I honestly would not have minded much if Huddersfield had lost; and I can't say more than that. It seemed to me as we drove home that Sheffield was a lovely picture after all, a city gold in warmth and feeling; and as we passed Lady Bower and began the long climb over the blue-topped Snake, I thought I heard the bells ringing from under the waters, not as a toll for old life that is gone, but as a peal for life which changes but does not decay and perhaps for the new life which has brought two recently struggling clubs right back to their former greatness.
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