YP Letters: Sports clubs are left to tackle a '˜can't be bothered' culture

What's to blame for a lack of interest in outdoor team sports?

MOLLY Preston (The Yorkshire Post, March 15) refers to how children used to play outdoor action games. Not half we did!

To my utter astonishment, one of the country’s top amateur rugby league clubs, Blackbrook in that hotbed of Rugby League, St Helens, had to inform the National Conference League, the top amateur league, that after one game they were unable to fulfil the rest of the season’s first-team fixtures and that the club’s Open Age team has been withdrawn.

Blackbrook is a very big club, with cubs aged from four to five years old, and 300 aged from under seven to 18 years of age playing in the 10 teams they are continuing to put out every week. Thank heaven for that, but still – unable to field a first team? In St Helens?

For years I have been bemoaning what I have called the ‘can’t be bothered society’. Training on a wet Tuesday and Thursday evening, getting back late from an away game for a Saturday night out, and even, in Blackbrook’s case, Liverpool live on TV at 12.30pm, all conspire to produce a couple of touchlines of supporters, many of whom should be playing rather than waiting to get in the clubhouse for a pint.

Is it computer entertainment which makes for a more comfortable way of spending leisure time? Is it girls waiting to go out when the modern game means more distant fixtures? Or is it that, if it’s not on a plate for them, youngsters just can’t be bothered.

But if they can’t in St Helens, heaven help the likes of Beverley and Barrow.

From: Janet Ella, Thorndale Croft, Wetwang, Driffield.

I AGREE wholeheartedly with Jayne Dowle’s recent column on obesity. When I was at secondary school in the 50s, we did Domestic Science, which covered every aspect of cooking and freshness of food especially about buying meat and fish. It was invaluable and I still adhere to these principles years later.

I was horrified to find out a few years ago that this subject had virtually vanished from the school curriculum. As Jayne says, a lot of younger parents have lost out on the art of cooking basic meals from scratch.

This in itself would save money in the long run and, with us having freezers, these could be made on a weekend for the following week’s meals.

No doubt cookery programmes have helped to stimulate interest, with more people now growing their own produce.