Aside from his role at OBHS, Clive is also Chairman NZ Secondary Schools’ Sports Council and was an All White in 1967.
When I look back on my own youth and what was important to us as boys, I found myself making some comparisons with the young men here at School.
During our primary school days in the summer we played cricket nearly every break. There would be five or six games being played with very little space between them. Some of the staff would come out and play with us. One man in particular was Alex Moir, a spin bowler and batsman, who was a member of the NZ team. We would attempt to get him out, a real challenge.
Five of my teachers at Mornington School were male, and most of them were pro sport. As a result we always had Physical Education with small ball handling and throwing, an activity we did a lot of. From year four through to year eight we were members of school teams that walked down to Kensington Oval for inter-school competitions and we loved it.
When I went home from school I would play cricket against the house. Usually the games were test matches and my team was sure to win. I saw myself as the best bowler and the No 1 batsman, a cricketing hero in my own eyes.
Rosebery Street where I lived is tree lined. The boys in the street played cricket between the trees. We constructed our own rules and the only gear we needed was a bat and a tennis ball.
Despite putting in the time that I did to cricket as a youngster, it was not the sport I was truly passionate about. Football (soccer) was my passion.
What we were not aware of was the critical factor for success in football. Ball skills. Youngsters today know that they must spend hours just juggling a ball to develop a top “touch”. Without that, in the speed of a game, your skills break down.
What I am describing is a signature of my age and stage. I am sure that this does not happen today and cricketing skills are the poorer for it. We literally spent hours throwing, catching, and developing great hand-eye co-ordination. As I watch the boys at Otago Boys’ High School in their PE lessons I am aware that few of my top athletes or the average competitor are good throwers of a ball. They very rarely demonstrate that skill so necessary to be a good cricketer, or to be anything that involves hitting or catching where hand-eye co-ordination is essential. What has changed? Very few men teach in primary education and those that do are unlikely to be top sportsmen. Today top sportsmen play as professionals.
Today there are a huge number of other sports and activities, often with a very formal organisation as opposed to our very informal, quick pick-up games we enjoyed.
All my junior boys have great bags of gear that seem to be essential to their playing cricket. This must be a real disincentive for boys from low socio-economic backgrounds.
Competition for time also comes from electronic games. These virtual worlds are a great magnet for boys as there are very clever international marketers working to hook boys into these worlds.
Specialization happens too soon. What is important when you are young is that you are able to play all sorts of games so that you develop a variety of physical and tactical skills. I recently read a great book by Bob Bigilow, a former NBA player. The book is titled “Just let the kids play” and he advocates the advice I am giving above. Get out, play whatever, enjoy the company and belonging to the group, taking part in sport without the pressure of a formal competition.
What has not changed are the ingredients for making the top in your chosen sport. Top of my list is passion. Without that passion you will not be prepared to put in the discipline and the hard yards. Passion recharges the batteries just when you need that.
Linked to passion is the dream. Believing that it is possible to represent your country and aspire to being the best in the world is half the battle. I call these dreams self-fulfilling prophesies. Without them you will never make it.
Third is focus. Focus on what is necessary to achieve the aim. Being prepared to put in the work. Nothing was ever achieved by waiting for it to happen. When you are developing skills, you must involve the mind as well as the body.
Visualize the correct action, practice the correct action. Only through serious repetition will the skill be converted from one you think about to one that is automatic.
Young sportsmen have great advantages today in that they can watch the best exponents of their sport playing on TV. They can have skills analysed by computer and can visualize just what is needed to make them part of their own repertoire. Sounds easy, doesn’t it?
I envy the youth of today and the opportunities that are there for them in sport. What we have in NZ is a system of sports participation that is the envy of the rest of the world. We must all work to protect it, and to try to expand participation as the benefits for all those who play sport are immense.
My thanks to the Willows for being one of the organisations that recognises the value of sport, cricket in particular, which creates such rich opportunities for the young men in our schools.