Winchester College - Sport

Sport

Winchester College has its own game, Winchester College football (also known as 'Win: Co: Fo:' or, more recently, 'Winkies'), played only at Winchester. It is played in Common Time (the spring term), the main game in Short Half (the autumn term) being Association football. In Cloister Time (the summer term) the main sports are tennis and cricket.

Winchester Football could be considered a cross between football and rugby, though this analogy shouldn't be taken too far since there are significant differences. For example, the ball can only be carried, like in rugby, if caught full toss. Furthermore, no football-type "dribbling" is allowed since the player may not touch the ball more than once at a time. Neither can the ball be passed to a team-mate, except by back-heeling to a teammate behind. Furthermore, a player who finds himself upfield must return to the point at which his teammate last kicked the ball before being able to join in the game again, unless in the interim an opposite player has touched the ball. The current form of the game can be played by teams of 6, 9, 10, 11, or 15. There are also rugby-type scrums known as "hots", which feature 8 forwards in the 15-player version and 3 in the 6-player version of the game. The objective is to kick the ball over the opponent's goal line ("worms"). The field ("canvas") is 73 m (240 ft) long and 24.5 m (60 ft) wide. It is delimited lengthwise by canvas netting and by posts threaded with a heavy rope that run parallel 1 metre inside the netting, and 1 metre above the ground.

There is also a distinctive Winchester version of Fives, resembling Rugby Fives but with a buttress on the court. Winchester currently has 4 active Winchester fives courts. It has been claimed that Rugby Fives and Winchester Fives are both forms of "Wessex Fives", and that Thomas Arnold took with him the game of Wessex Fives he played as a boy at what is now Warminster School when he became the Headmaster of Rugby School.

At one time Winchester was one of the Lord's schools, competing in a trilateral cricket tournament with Eton and Harrow; and for this reason the first cricket eleven is still known as "Lords" (with or without the apostrophe). Since 1855 Winchester has not taken part in this, instead playing Eton alternately at the two schools. Eton Match, when played at Winchester, was until recently the major event attended by Old Wykehamists and the main showcase for the school and its activities, but now most of the non-cricket-related functions have been moved to "Wykeham Day" in the autumn. Eton Match itself has now been replaced by "Winchester Day", featuring a match between Wykehamists and Old Wykehamists. The cricket ground has held one first-class match, held in 1875 when Hampshire played Kent.

Rackets is also played. Should the same person be Captain of Lord's and Captain of Rackets, he is known as "Lord of Lords and Prince of Princes", in allusion to Prince's Club in London.

The "Winchester Ice Club" was formed in 1904 by R. L. G. Irving; amongst its first members was George Mallory, who later died on Mount Everest.