Page:Hockey, Canada's Royal Winter Game.djvu/74

 There seems to be a growing tendency now-a-days to resort to football tactics in hockey. Among some of the senior teams the practice of interference is becoming prominent, and should be severely checked, because it is an unfailing cause of unnecessary roughness. No player, however mild, who is rushing down the ice to secure an advantageous position, will allow himself to be deliberately interrupted, stopped by an opponent who has not, and should not have the right to oppose his course, without picking a bone or two with him. Another innovation that is calculated to injure the game, is mass plays. This rupture of the rules was conspicuous among certain teams last year. It might be hard to imagine or detect such a thing in hockey, but it, nevertheless, occurs. It is practically "concentrated interference," in technical terms, and, as in football, is used by the team which attempts to score, a point which distinguishes it from simple interference as used by an attacked team to prevent scoring. To be properly carried out it involves the disregard for the rule regulating onside movements, and is therefore, though difficult to detect, a breach of the same. The teams in cities where the practice of interference in foot-ball is more popular, are the most given to this play.

It is essential that the two centre men and the right wing should be able to shoot the