I was a member of the Jesus College Hockey eleven which went undefeated and won the First Division in 1965-1966 and as a result of that success was treated to a ‘bangers and mash’ supper by the then Principal, J T Christie.
It was probably the last of his munificent gestures because he retired in 1967. I suppose it was a sort of equivalent to a ‘bumps’ supper. We were a consistently good team, and I think at full strength we had a couple of players who played for the University. However, because they were not allowed to play in Cuppers, we missed out winning that cup.
Although I came up to Jesus as a left back, and had met a fellow Jesus hockey player – D. Willis – at a final trial for the Welsh Schoolboys in 1963 – 64 (he was chosen, I wasn’t), during my second year I was coerced into playing in goal, supposedly there was no one else. I wasn’t very good, but the right back, Pout (a post grad chemist), was extraordinarily effective and if I had to save five shots on goal all season then I might be exaggerating. Hewitt was a great Captain, and Slatford, I seem to remember, was a bamboozling forward and star of the eleven. Others might disagree but as I was a fairly effective spectator I think my opinion is to be valued.
It was an interesting year, we played the ‘girls’ from M&S, and journeyed across country to beat Jesus Cambridge, but most memorable was a unique and historical event. I can’t remember where we were playing, but I know it was adjacent to the railway line to Bladon, and it was Saturday January 30th. The train carrying Winston Churchill’s coffin rumbled by, and our match was brought to a halt. We stood to attention with heads bowed until the train passed.
The story of the Jesus/BNC 1966 lacrosse team is very different. A fellow Geographer from BNC, Shuttleworth by name, was keen to enter a team into cuppers but couldn’t recruit enough players from his own college so a couple of us were persuaded to joined in. We hardly knew the rules and try as we might we were not at all effective. I can’t remember the name of the college we played but they comprehensively outplayed us. It was invigorating, exciting, exhausting trying to chase down our opponents and sort of exciting, because we lost by the narrowest of margins on account of our goalkeeper (if that is the appropriate name). He was a Rhodes Scholar, who was an enormously muscular and giant of a man. It was impossible to get the ball past his well-padded defence. That single goal was a pure fluke!
But the best thing about the Jesus sports ground were the showers! In those days for normal ablutions we had eight baths down in the cellar in the third quad and that was it. When the JCR petitioned for showers it was reported that J.C. responded that they were at the sports ground. And they were!