What Ho!
I will be taking a break over Easter, but before I go let me just say that the news about the annual Boat Race is a national disgrace.
Forget the fact that they will be rowing in sewerage, it seems that once again Oxford and Cambridge have made it to the final. What are the odds, the same finalists for almost 200 years now?
This kind of elitist tosh belongs to a Jeeves and Wooster novelette, where Jeeves rescues his master after he has been caught trying to steal a policeman’s helmet.
Do we really want to tell the world that this is a country where only public school boys at the two top universities are worth watching row? Do we deliberately want to exclude students from the other 140 universities?
Because funnily enough we don’t televise the Oxford Cambridge football matches, or its squash finals or its lacrosse tournaments. We don’t even televise the finals of university football tournaments when any and every university has a chance of winning.
But Oxford and Cambridge rowing we do.
Strangely enough Oxford and Cambridge are banned from one competition, University Challenge; where they are not allowed to take part but do get 20 or 30 chances to win because individual colleges are allowed to compete.
Strange that in rowing the crews represent the universities but in a general knowledge quiz those universities don’t exist. Because every parent proudly boats that their kids have got into Brasenose or Selwyn, never Oxford or Cambridge
It is surprising that any other university ever wins University Challenge but they do, which may be why the boat race doesn’t even let anyone else try.
What would happen if other universities even got a chance? The comp. oiks might actually win.
Wooster would wobble, his lower lip quiver, Jeeves would have to mix him a stiffener sharpish, and fetch Aunt Agatha the smelling salts.
What Ho!
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