Mob Games and rational recreation
What were mob games like?
What was rational recreation?
Why did it happen?
Mob Games
Boys arriving at schools from villages bought their versions of
mob games with them
 Violent
 No boundaries
 No limit to number of players
 No rules (or very simple rules)
 Involved gross movements
 Limited skill needed
ETON Wall game video
Rationalisation of games
Rationalisation of games
The boys began to participate in physical activities such as
swimming, fighting and racket games.
 However, team games still dominant recreational activity
 Schools under pressure to control behaviour of their pupils
and this was seen as best way
Rationalisation of games
School Masters realised the potential of these games for channelling boys
energies if given rules
 Mob football underwent a number of changes
 More regularly in games lessons
 Number of players restricted
 Equipment became sophisticated, real goals used
 Positional roles established- assigned different tasks
 Leadership role of captain formed
 Competition structure was defined
 School specific rules eventually gave way to nationally recognised
ones- Codification
Rationalisation of games (cont.)
Many public schools initially developed their own
 Games were often self governed by the boys- teaching them organisational skills
 Committees set up and hierarchical structure created
 ‘Blues’ were employed as member of the school to help them achieve victory on
the sports field
 ‘Blues’ were often former pupils who had been awarded a ‘colour’ whilst
playing and returned to coach
 By this time the games cult had taken over with schools using sporting success to
impress perspective parents
 Fixtures were reported in press
 Sports day became a PR exercise- impressing parents
 Headmasters allocated more of school budget for sporting facilities (still done
today)