Page:Association Football and How to Play It (1908) by John Cameron.djvu/35

 Rh the summer game. I refer to the two half-backs, the brothers Wilkinson. W. H., the half-back, has never done better as a cricketer. He is a lefthanded batsman, and has made a great advance on anything he has done before, while B. Wilkinson is a player of some repute. Lewis, of Somerset; Makepeace, of Lancashire; Ducat, of Surrey; Iremonger, of Notts; and Leach and Vincett, of Sussex, are all cricketers who have done splendid work during the summer game, and have turned out footballers perfectly fit at the beginning of the season. Indeed, if you play cricket as it should be played it is magnificent training for football. It is hard work getting fit at the start of the season if you have allowed your muscles to become flabby, while there may be no regular circulation of the blood, and generally the muscles that you require are very lethargic, so the difficulty is with those who do not play tennis or cricket, or go in for rowing or swimming or some other form of active exercise during the summer, that they will have to take up some serious practice. Skipping is good, walking and running, especially short sprinting, while punch-ball exercise and dumbbells may be used. There should be moderation in all things, and one must start carefully at first and increase the amount of training until one feels fit. During the season walking and some practice at kicking, with an occasional sprint, are quite enough to keep the player well. It is quite possible that some may suffer from the tremendous amount of energy that they put into their game. I do not think that those who work indoors, such as