Speaker’s corner

ISEE an Under-13s soccer team played a rival school not long ago and, looking at pictures, the rival school seems to have fielded its Standard 10s. What does one do? Ask the Almighty to make sure the honest side wins. And fair enough – why not? It’s when it to comes to high school rugby that I wonder about pre-match prayers – and international rugby, where so many players, especially South Africans, publicly thank God for playing a part in their victory.

In South Africa, where many private schools are church schools the morning assembly might be called on to pray for their team when it is about to play a big match.

I irreverently picture Moses looking down on St Walter’s College’s sunny acres where it is about to clash with arch rival, St Geralds, for the schools national championship.

Moses: O God, Thou hast given me an onerous task. Listen to St Walter’s engaged in earnest pre-match prayers! Am I to listen to them or to their opponents, St Geralds? They pray so earnestly?

But they fail to realise that there are 3 million other fixtures this weekend, from darts at the Wigan YMCA to the Eskimo’s walrus bladder-tossing semi-finals in Prudoe Bay. All calling for some degree of divine help.

God: Moses, there are worse jobs than yours up here, believe me. If you’d prefer opening and shutting the Pearly Gates I can arrange for you to swop with Peter.

Moses: No, no. I favour St Walter’s over St Garald’s – they seem to be praying hardest. God: Moses, why interfere at all? Moses: Well, take that fellow heading for the try line at this moment. He was responsible for an almighty – if you’ll forgive the expression – punch-up last week and should be punished. (Moses’s eyes narrow as he points a gnarled finger. The boy goes sprawling.)

God: Moses! Enough! First you make him drop the ball right when he was near the try line and now he almost breaks a leg!

Moses (giving embarrassed little cough): Maybe I was a little harsh. There, the magic water has done the trick, he’s back on the pitch. I’ll let him score a try.

God: Just stop interfering. After all, how in heaven’s name do you propose dealing with the fervent 550 million Roman Catholic soccer fans right across the Latin World calling for divine intervention in 9 876 fixtures? And there’s the poor South African soccer team…

Moses: And the South African T20 team cricketers… and Parktown Girls’ Under-14 netball team. But, Lord, it’s one of the few privileges I enjoy, picking a weekend match and manipulating it.

God: You must stop. Anyway, a genuinely unselfish sportsman would be praying for his opposition to win. Hark, do I hear another prayer coming up from South Africa?

Moses: It’s that Durban fellow again, at Greyville. He says if Thou letest Golden Arrow win the 5th race he’ll give 10 percent to All Saints Church.

God: Never intervene in betting or politics, no matter how hard those sinners pray.

Moses: Incidentally, Lord, when Thou wast receiving supplications from the Outer Mongolian cow-pat throwing team I saw Joel Rabinowitz secretly practising his golf swing at Glen Haddock – on the SABBATH! But I fixed him. God: How? Moses: I let him hit a hole in one from 230m! God: That’s punishment? Moses: Verily! Who could he tell? God and Moses do a high five. Ring! Ring! Hello, this is the Speaker’s Cor… CLARKE! O heavens, it’s him, the E*D*I*T*O*R. Clarke! That’s the third time I have heard that Jurassic golf joke and I’m tired of it!

Well, Sir, how about the one about the bishop and… click.

Sir? Sir?