- 2 months ago
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:08we're a nation obsessed with sport every year we spend nine billion hours either playing it
00:15or just watching it and Britain has been the birthplace of so many sports which are now
00:22played the world over in this special program we'll be celebrating four of our most popular
00:27games football rugby cricket tennis and the Olympics something for everybody at our road
00:37shows across the UK we asked you to share your cherished sporting mementos what he achieved
00:43was groundbreaking he actually changed racing we'll be visiting some of our hallowed sports
00:50grounds and delving into the archives from ancient manuscripts at Lord's Cricket Ground
00:54these are the oldest written rules of cricket still in existence to a coin used to start the
01:01most important match in English football history oh my goodness me there cannot be many people stupid
01:09enough to pay thousands of pounds for a penny but it's what the penny represents our experts
01:15get a glimpse of the extraordinary archives at the home of tennis down here we've got Tim
01:20Henman's racket from 2002 oh it's very tempting to we'll be speaking with legendary British Olympians
01:27and Paralympians it was the greatest sporting moment of my life it makes me emotional just just talking
01:39about it and we'll hear the remarkable story of the lost lionesses footballers who fought for the right
01:45to play on the world's greatest sporting stage after playing in front of a few people at home on
01:50park pitches we played in front of 95,000 we were felt like celebrities welcome to a special sporting edition
01:59of the antics roadshow
02:08we begin with the country's favorite sport football every year over 2 million people play and stadiums see 50 million
02:18people come through the gates
02:21and today we're at Craven Cottage home to Fulham FC London's oldest professional club dating back to 1879
02:34various games called football date back centuries but the sport we know today comes from the Victorian era
02:40in 1863 the Football Association came together to lay down the rules including no picking up the ball and
02:48no player shall wear projecting nails or iron plates on his boots at our show at Shuttleworth house in
02:55Bedfordshire Mark Allen saw a group of items from when these rules had only just been agreed
03:02this is a story about early football isn't it it's about a very very personal story for you too and
03:09I'm
03:10captivated by this wonderful Victorian photograph here in the centre so the gentleman at the front with the
03:16medals that's my great-grandfather he was born in 1867 right he founded that club the Norfolkians
03:22football club in about 1882 of course we're talking amateur football here yes yeah the name Norfolkians
03:30is a bit weird because it was based in Maidenhead but I think it comes from the fact it was
03:34close to
03:35Norfolk Park or Norfolk Road or something like that which is where the name come from right and they
03:40obviously did quite well it was an amateur team won a lot of cups and everything else yeah and that's
03:45the the photograph of the team after they won the Wickham Cup in 1892 right well I can see they
03:50did
03:50rather well because we've got rather a lot kind of going on in this case particularly haven't we and we
03:55can see him actually wearing these on his jacket his blazer now what I love about that is this absolutely
04:02tangible connection between these objects and him and you in essence I mean this has obviously been
04:08in the family for a hundred and you know 30 140 years yeah so it's nice to be able to
04:13go back and
04:14there's a bit of background in fact because the Norfolkians they ended up merging with the Maidenhead
04:19football club right but they hated each other right okay and there were numerous press stories and
04:25papers and things like that from the period where there were fights people got sent off because they
04:30attacked spectators oh my gosh well I can see uh from the third case as well that this story evolved
04:36didn't it because over there we've got lots of FA stewards badges and they're all variously dated from
04:41the 1920s and 30s so what happened I presume he moved on from his playing days did he indeed he
04:48um the club
04:49itself he left in about 1913 at which time he was the general secretary but even from then onwards he
04:56actually became part of the FA he was one of the junior people was heavily involved in being stewards
05:01at the equivalent of the FA cups and things like that which in those days was held in Crystal Palace
05:06because Wembley of course wasn't built until 1923 but but some of these are after 1923 so they would have
05:13been presumably at Wembley I'm quite enamored of the idea of of this as a complete sort of story and
05:20timeline
05:21and I think this is quite a valuable little collection in terms of early football memorabilia I
05:27know you're not going to sell this but I think contextually with the photographers and particularly
05:31some of those good FA stewards badges I think you know putting a value on this for auction in a
05:37good
05:37sporting sale I can easily see this being worth around about two to three thousand pounds I think
05:42he'd be shocked thank you a really really good little collection to see thank you from these
05:53amateur beginnings in Victorian Britain the high point of British football history remains the men's
05:58World Cup win in 1966 the home tournament saw England face off against West Germany in the final at
06:06Wembley over 96,000 people crowded into the stadium to see England's 4-2 victory with a further 32 million
06:16people watching at home making it still the most watched event in British television history and back at
06:24Craven Cottage I've arranged to meet Nigel Ray one of the world's foremost collectors of sports memorabilia and the proud
06:30owner of two objects from this iconic match Nigel tell me about this shirt and who it belonged to
06:37Nobby Siles the famous image of him running around Wembley in 66 no teeth memorably this is his shirt he
06:46actually wore in 66 finals I mean what an iconic bit of kit my goodness from that game I mean
06:53how important
06:53was he to England's success that day I think it was huge actually there's some great stories about what
06:59Alfred Ramsey asked him to do which was basically hunt the good players down and take him down yes he
07:07wasn't a brilliant footballer but he stopped people he's a man stopper yeah literally yes and what was
07:14he like off the pitch you couldn't get anybody more modest Manchester United through and through lived and
07:19died for it a great guy great guy well listen we're not only looking at Nobby Siles' shirt from the
07:241966 game you've also got the coin from the coin toss I will even give it to you provide you
07:29provide not to drop
07:30it down the drain oh my goodness me look at that and there cannot be many people stupid enough to
07:39pay
07:40thousands and thousands and thousands of pounds for a penny but it's what the penny represents I mean to all
07:45the
07:46footy fans out there there's something magnificent about 1966 of course also something slightly tragic
07:51and then that is the last time we won yeah and we still live off it because I live off
07:56it younger
07:57people watching today will not recognize this I do and you do as an old English penny of course I
08:01mean
08:02this is what we grew up with I can't even remember what a penny worth 2.4 pence I don't
08:08know I would
08:09take it down to the corner shop to get sweets I don't know about you but what a fantastic thing
08:13to hold in
08:13my hand my goodness I mean all my family are crazy football fans but to have this next to Nobby
08:19Siles' shirt and do you think the way this coin landed on that day do you think that made any
08:24difference to us winning or losing no well said what a thrill to see it thank you so much thank
08:31you very
08:32much we'll have more stories from the beautiful game later in the program
08:43but now we travel across London to another legendary sporting ground
08:49this is the long room at Lord's Cricket Ground the home of the Marylebone Cricket Club and to
08:56many the home of cricket itself
09:03cricket doesn't have rules it has laws and since 1788 the MCC here at Lord's has been responsible for
09:11them as with all sports these were the results of years of tinkering and changing and our sports
09:18memorabilia expert David Convery is with cricket archivist Richard Geffen who brought some even
09:23older laws which show how different the game once was Richard we find ourselves at Lord's Cricket
09:30Ground here started buying some wonderful memorabilia but my focus and attention is on this document and
09:36in front of us now I've known about this I've read about it but to get to see it as
09:41a real treat for me tell us what it is go on
09:43these are the oldest written rules of cricket still in existence and they were written for a match in 1727
09:52between the Duke of Richmond and Mr Broderick now the Duke of Richmond is based at Goodwood in Goodwood House
09:58in Chichester and Mr Broderick is grounded at Pepper Harrow which is between Milford and Godalming in Surrey
10:05now at this time rules were just local competitions there was no sort of unified rules of any part of
10:12the country so each set of
10:13rules was unique to that individual or in this case to the Duke and of course Mr Broderick and I
10:19notice there's 16 written rules here a few have caught my eye of course 12 men
10:23yes number three the ball being clothed or unclothed now various interpretations of that rule
10:29for me obviously catching the ball on the jumper or in the caps ungentlemanly yes if you caught it obviously
10:37that was fine but in those days obviously it wasn't allowed and I think I'm right in saying it must
10:42have been quite difficult to be caught because I think the ball was rolled along the ground in those early
10:46days rather than bounced and here the rule states that if somebody's
10:51taken injured you can replace them within Pepper Harrow within the parish and the Duke had to be a player
10:57from
10:57the last three games but interestingly if they couldn't find somebody then the other side dropped
11:02one down and the one that got me prize money number 10 on the list here 12 shillings wasn't a
11:07bad purse for
11:08those days no and modern money is about two two and a half thousand pounds so not too bad and
11:14very much in
11:15over the batsman you know with only two stumps yeah absolutely I have to say thank you for bringing
11:20it along it's a real bucket list moment for me I'm taking into account what the rules of football made
11:262011
11:27they were sold they made just shy of a million pounds I reckon if it came to auction I've no
11:33hesitation
11:33of value in between 300 and 500 thousand pounds it is a true piece of sporting history it's unique isn't
11:39it
11:42the first international cricket match wasn't played here but in New York between the USA and Canada
11:48which Canada won by 23 runs the first international game in England wasn't until 1880 against Australia
11:56and then the game spread through the British Empire and in 1932 the Indian test cricket team came to these
12:03shores and played their first game at Lord's they'd have walked out of the long room down these steps
12:08onto the ground and I expect they thought as I am Wow
12:17and joining us at Lord's are a father and daughter with items from that match
12:24we've brought a cricket bat with us today and this has been in the possession of my father for over
12:2920
12:29years and I grew up in Hong Kong and my dad had a best friend when we were there called
12:34Solly and I
12:35actually gifted my dad this cricket bat and the book that you see in front of us
12:41the bad dates from 1932 it was his grandfather's Surabhaja Kola who was actually one of the players who toured
12:49in the 1932 test tour of England which I believe because India had just been awarded ICC official status was
12:58the first test and the first tour India had officially done so historically it's got an awful lot of relevance
13:05to it he seems to have got pretty much all of the signatures from the county team and the first
13:11tour India had officially done so historically it's got an awful lot of relevance to it
13:11the national teams and the national teams and it really is full you know front back and even down the
13:17sides as well it's just a fascinating piece of history
13:20it's just a fascinating piece of history there's a scorebook that goes with it which records all of the games
13:24across the tour and the pages are absolutely full so it was clearly a very grueling tour
13:29quite excitingly this page has um documented one of the matches that they played here at lords
13:36within it there's a fuller on this page called nissan he has five wickets so he's on the honor boards
13:43here at lords
13:45i've always felt like an imposter with the bat i'd really always wanted to reconnect with soli and i'd love
13:51to give it back to him if he's um if he's still around so soli if you're out there we
13:56have a bat and book for you
14:08the first mention of men's cricket dates all the way back to the 1550s but the earliest known women's game
14:14wasn't played until 1744
14:17and it took until 1934 for the first international women's game between england and australia in brisbane
14:25at our show at shuttleworth house siobhan tyrrell saw some items from one of the earliest pioneers of women's cricket
14:33we've got a lovely blazer here and photographs i mean the blazer looks like it would possibly fit you
14:38i think it might fit me at the university of bedfordshire we house a tremendous archive of women's sporting history
14:47history and this particular blazer is from the 1920s and it was worn we believe by very famous
14:54england cricketer betty snowball who was also a student at bedford between 1927 and 1930
15:02so is this betty here and with her team yes it's the bedford cricket team and there's betty sitting at
15:09the front there with the cricket bat just in front of her a great shot isn't it she would have
15:14been about
15:1420 21 years old then right start of her career yes she played for england at cricket from 1934
15:22to 1949 she went in the first test match and she went over to australia and to new zealand so
15:29she was an
15:29early trailblazer of cricket women's cricket she was indeed and on the way back and the fourth test was in
15:37new zealand and betty was only five feet and she scored 189 runs against new zealand at christchurch
15:45and her record held for 88 years and 128 days amazing and it was only recently beaten by an england
15:55cricketer
15:55tammy beaumont in 2023 but she wasn't just a cricketer she was a sports person really wasn't she
16:03absolutely though she played cricket for england she played lacrosse and squash for scotland amazing
16:09these women were at the cutting edge they were pioneers before the female cricketers now that we see on
16:15television at last so difficult to value you've bowled me a a tricky one here sorry i have i think
16:23it needs
16:24to go into the right auction so it really needs to go into a sporting memorabilia auction and this area
16:30of
16:30collecting women's sporting memorabilia has really grown and you've got an amazing archive here and it's
16:36lovely to have a photograph that's got to be worth between three thousand to five thousand pounds such a
16:43growing market wow gosh quick question did we beat the aussies of course
17:00and women's cricket is increasingly getting the recognition it deserves in 2022 the east gate at
17:07lords was renamed in honor of rachel hayhoe flint ex-england captain and the first female cricketer to hit a
17:14six in a test match walking around lords is like walking through the history of cricket and one of the
17:24sport's most prized trophies is here in the club's museum the ashes urn
17:32the story of the urn dates back to 1882 when australia beat england in a match played in london's
17:39other famous cricket ground the oval it was the first time that england had been defeated on home
17:46soil and the next day this mock obituary appeared in the sporting times and it said in affectionate
17:53remembrance of english cricket which died at the oval rip the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to
18:01australia ouch there was already a plan for the english team to head over to australia so when they
18:09set out three weeks later the english captain ivo bligh promised to recover the ashes of english cricket
18:17england won the series 2-1 and after the final match ivo was presented with this small urn
18:24thought to be a perfume bottle with ashes inside what the ashes actually are is a bit of a mystery
18:33one story says they're the ashes of a bale used in the final match another claims they're the remains
18:39of a wedding veil either way the ashes have been fought over by countless players ever since
18:45and while this replica urn is given to the winning captain the genuine article remains here
19:01so international sporting competitions began with cricket other sports soon followed in rugby the
19:08longest rivalry is between scotland and england starting in the 1870s and our next sporting location
19:15is the stone x stadium home of the saracens rugby club here our expert adam schoon is with rugby
19:22collector jeff nagel when a player suits up for england for the first time they're given a cap and
19:28jeff's collection shows how a sport which began on british school fields spread across the globe jeff
19:35we're looking at three rugby caps from your collection which bridge the dates from 1872 right through to 1909
19:46tell us a little bit about the first cap this relates to the very beginning of 20-a-side rugby
19:53the first international in england played at the oval cricket ground on a very wet day
19:59we then progress through to first fixture against the french 1906 a very cold trip to paris and we end
20:06up with an unusual one with awf which relates to the first game against australia the touring wallabies
20:12and then we play wiles and france so you have an introduction to the game as it spreads globally
20:19yeah so 20 men then it went to 15 when did it change within a number of years i mean
20:2520 aside on a wet pitch um
20:28it's a lot of a lot of muscle pushing against each other and probably not a lot of finesse
20:33so looking at the cap it's made of this absolutely beautiful velvet in panels and of course they're
20:40quite sort of tinsely looking you've got this absolutely gorgeous tassel the origin is the origin
20:47comes from rugby school the different house caps hence the name um you can imagine lots of proud
20:52victorian gentlemen with their handlebars mustaches sitting with their arms folded incredibly proud
20:58of their individual caps we once had an empire and during that time the military would go around
21:05the world you think of new zealand australia south africa and they took the game with them yeah and
21:12now it is absolutely global isn't it what makes these quite unusual is that they're dated normally
21:18an england player will be given a plain cap silver rose most people keep them blank which makes it
21:24hard to identify but these have all been embroidered and you can relate them to certain players careers
21:30so thomas batson from the blackheath club and he played in the first three games at the oval and what
21:36about the man who earned this cap thomas hogarth interesting character a shipyard worker from hartlepool
21:43he was invited to play for england they were a player short on their first ever trip to paris
21:48in that first international against the french that's interesting because somebody from harleypool
21:54working in the industry yeah mixing probably with ex-public school boys but you've got that first
22:01social mix which is what rugby is all about today isn't it the way the game has has spread and
22:07then
22:08finally we move on to frank tar frank tar was a solicitor who played for leicester frank tar sadly
22:15passed during the war he was the first international to sign up on the first day of the war sadly
22:21like
22:22so many of that generation he uh didn't come back does make this cap particularly poignant well they're
22:28all in incredibly fine condition value wise i mean this one obviously is incredibly rare incredibly early
22:39what a survivor five to eight thousand pounds for that one at auction very nice and these two i think
22:45probably two to three thousand pounds a piece maybe a little more because you know who owned them
22:52the fact we can relate them to individual characters yes and tell their story as well
22:56they give a lot of pleasure
23:01the competition between england and scotland became known as the calcutta cup
23:05named for its links to early british rugby clubs in india
23:11and one viewer contacted us about a memento of that famous grudge match
23:18this here in front of me is a corner flag from the calcutta cup 1928 which took place in twickenham
23:26so this is my great great grandfather admiral sir percy royds he was the president of the rugby
23:34football union from 1927 to 1928 he was a rugby player he played three times for england
23:43he also played for teams like kent and the barbarians and in the royal navy as well
23:48it was given to him after the match took place the flag is made of silk it's got very intricate
23:54stitching england v scotland and on the other side of this flag it is this really pretty blue
24:01silk embroidery we've got the england rose there and the scotland thistle there it is coming apart
24:05a little bit but it's mostly in quite good condition it is very interesting how they have
24:11these really pretty delicate silk flags just flying on the poles on the corner while the match was taking
24:16place and of course there are four corners of the pitch so there would be four corner flags in total
24:21we only have this one so there might be three still out there somewhere so maybe if anyone watching
24:27does have um another one from this match 1928 you might have the other flags that go with this one
24:35and it wasn't just england and scotland who fell in love with the sport
24:39in wales rugby came close to a religion at our roadshow in swansea ben rogers jones saw one of its
24:47greatest players immortalized in pottery it's a great privilege and an honor to introduce two knights
24:55of the realm to the antiques roadshow sir gareth owen edwards and sir gerald reams davis both huge heroes
25:05of mine from the golden years of welsh rugby in the 1970s knighted for their sporting prowess and of course
25:13their proud owner how long have you had them i've had them since 1977. these are my heroes these are
25:20gerald davis and gareth edwards fantastic players absolutely yeah they were they were top of the
25:25game top of the top of the world game in the 1970s so these are grogs of course made in
25:32ponterpreet
25:32that's right by a sculptor called john hughes that's right and i've got great admiration for john hughes
25:38because he was not just a great sculptor but he was a brilliant entrepreneur so he started potting
25:45in his shed in the back garden and realized he was pretty good he bought an old pub converted into
25:52this
25:52shop and started tapping into the rugby market in the best time to do it in the 1970s when welsh
25:59rugby
25:59was on a high so where do these sit at home oh i go on a little bureau they encapsulate
26:06the moment
26:07you've got gareth's sideburns and his flowing hair and that pose he was so cheeky he was so determined
26:14and gerald the flying winger with his beautiful mustache beautiful hair scoring a try absolutely
26:21fantastic and it's so evocative of a brilliant time for welsh rugby be really good to know what
26:28the players thought of these pieces because i'm not sure how i'd feel if i was a grog in all
26:34honesty
26:35it would be good to know should we ask somebody uh yeah sir gareth edwards how are you
26:41oh hello how are you come off it looks like you spinning spitting image isn't it
26:56so do you remember your first grog yes didn't look anything like that in actual fact it was very
27:03good looking what he was good at he captured the moment yeah that's what artists do isn't it really
27:09yes you know like when i was looking there i could see gerald just putting that ball down
27:16i would say and forgive me sir gareth i think on this occasion sir gerald will make a little bit
27:23more than you and i hope you don't mind he can try he can try it's not quite as refined
27:33as sir gerald
27:35in this pose and i think that's a really really nice try scoring pose so they're both brilliant but
27:41um i am going to give you estimates here gareth is getting demoted at three to four hundred pounds
27:50sir gerald i think would do rather well at six to eight hundred pounds on this occasion but there will
27:58be occasions when you do better sir gareth i i can assure you that'll do me
28:10while football rugby and cricket spread across the world some victorian sports did not take off
28:17walking competitions lasting days at a time we've sadly left behind and croquet was once a social
28:23phenomenon one of the few games men and women could play together in 1868 the all england croquet club
28:31was founded in wimbledon to capitalize on the new craze but it didn't take long for the hoops and
28:38mallets to make way for a brand new sport sweeping the nation lawn tennis
28:46hillary kaye went to see the archives of the all england lawn tennis and croquet club
28:50to find out more today wimbledon is the most watched tennis event in the world with over 500 000
28:58people pouring through the gates each year and millions more watching from home but how did this
29:03corner of west london come to be home to one of the world's favorite sports emma trahern is the senior
29:10curator of the wimbledon lawn tennis museum and has dug out some of the club's earliest treasures to share
29:15with hillary we're surrounded by amazing things in the museum here at wimbledon can you walk me through
29:22what we're looking at here on the table yes we've got some very lovely items here we've got 40 000
29:28objects in the collection so just a few of them here for you uh there was a chap called walter
29:32wingfield
29:34who sort of launched lawn tennis or spheristic a was another word that he used to describe his
29:40new game um in 1874 and this is one of his rule books here okay and you would buy your
29:47rule book
29:47but you could also buy everything you needed to play lawn tennis uh including the rackets which he
29:52referred to as bats uh your net and it all came in a nice little box a bit like a
29:57croquet set would come
29:58in there are two different sizes but most people bought the five guinea one which was the smaller one
30:03which was quite a lot of money in those days i mean it's interesting isn't it first of all the
30:07the title
30:08is in ancient greek and then to sell it for five guineas which is about 750 pounds today it wasn't
30:13for everybody this game no he was aiming at people who had time to play um and also croquet was
30:21a sport
30:21that was falling out of favor and so he'd noticed all these big houses had their croquet lawns were sort
30:27of lying idle so that was his idea was to design a game that men and women could play together
30:32that was
30:33very important for him on these less used croquet pitches so what kind of man was major winfield
30:40we do think that he was a bit of an inventor generally um he invented a type of bicycle called
30:46the butterfly bicycle and then after launching lawn tennis quite a few years later he uh launched
30:52something which he described as bicycle gymkhana as well which was cycling in sort of unison to music
30:58mainly military marches and he published a book on this and was hoping it was going to be the next
31:03lawn tennis but obviously we're not all doing bicycle gymkhana yeah i want to see that as an
31:08olympic sport that would be wonderful wouldn't it so it became a craze and then between 1874 when it was
31:15launched then in 1877 bang you had the first wimbledon championship i mean it's extraordinary
31:22progress isn't it yes so 200 people turned up paid their shillie to get in and 22 men it was
31:29just men
31:29then playing uh the singles uh expensive or beat uh william marshall in the final and he actually did
31:35say that he didn't think that tennis was going to catch on uh he found it quite a monotonous sport
31:41uh but luckily he was wrong tennis equipment has changed a lot since spencer gore won the first
31:53tournament with a wooden racket and in the basement stores at wimbledon is a treasure trove of rackets
31:59used at the championships my goodness emma look at this and this is extraordinary what a collection
32:08this is our main racket store uh we have over a thousand in the collection we've actually got an
32:12example here of the earliest metal rackets that the public could buy this racket was made in aberdeen
32:19around the 1890s it's quite heavy it's strung with natural gut but um some of the other early
32:27metal rackets from the sort of 1920s they tried stringing them with metal the bright vibrations were
32:32very horrible on people's hands i would never have believed that there'd be one from the 1890s
32:37uh made of metal the metal racket that i'm more familiar with was the racket that billy jean king
32:44used yes wilson t2000 got an example here and we've got many others in the collection um so this was
32:51basically the first successful metal racket it was around the 1970s that the synthetic fibers of stringing
32:58did come in before that point um it was natural gut it was often colloquially called cat gut but it
33:04wasn't cat it was intended to be sheep or cattle i heard that jokovic and roger federer still use
33:11basically gut strings for their matches yeah some some of the top players do uh choose to have either
33:17a mixture or or natural gut stringing yes to their to their rackets they haven't done too badly with it
33:25and one level deeper in the stores are hundreds of clothes worn by famous players
33:30from the mini skirts of the 1960s to the earlier outfits which were a bit more well full coverage
33:38this looks very early what sort of date do you put on that so around 1890 this is very much
33:44at that period what you might step out onto a lawn tennis court wearing if you're a lady there weren't
33:50any rules about what you could wear on the tennis court for a very very long time actually that
33:54really early period a lady would have just worn her normal dress on the court so it would have
33:58been very very colorful whatever day dress she was wearing but fairly quickly after a couple of years
34:04ladies decided that white might be a good idea basically white doesn't show sweat exactly so
34:10something like this would have been perfect uh yes 1890s it's that kind of lighter fabric as well you
34:15can see it's sort of like a linen blend uh so very good for like a summer garden party was
34:21there a
34:22point when this sort of unofficial rule of wearing white became official at wimbledon yes actually it
34:28was in 1962 that moya bueno wore an outfit with a shocking pink lining and it was at that point
34:34we
34:34decided we would bring in a rule so in 1963 it was predominantly white is what everyone had to wear
34:40in 1995 we tightened it up a bit further and it's almost entirely white so now there's no question
34:48that if you see somebody playing in white on a green surface it is 99.9 certain to be at
34:54wimbledon
34:54yes that's right
35:04there was only one tournament when players didn't have to wear white at wimbledon the olympics in 2012.
35:10the culmination of which saw andy murray win gold against roger federer in the men's singles final
35:17the 2012 london games were the third time britain had hosted the olympics and though greece was home
35:23to the ancient games the seed of the modern olympics was planted here in britain in much wenlock a small
35:30shropshire market town in 1850 local surgeon william penny brooks wanted to promote the moral physical
35:37and intellectual improvement of the town by hosting the wenlock olympian games these would go on to
35:44inspire the first modern olympics in 1896. 12 years later in 1908 the olympic games were held in london
35:52for the first time and at our show at shuttleworth house john foster saw a gold medal from those games
35:59won by lieutenant wyndham haswell under unique circumstances
36:06my great uncle joined the army he ended up to be a very good runner in the army
36:12and and got to the point of being the best did the interim olympics in greece uh ran in london
36:19i think
36:20his last race probably see you're kind of downplaying it a bit because wyndham haswell really is a game
36:27changer in the world of of olympics do you know that story uh vaguely what he achieved was groundbreaking
36:33because races weren't run in lanes at this point it was just a free-for-all and in other countries
36:41like
36:41america nudging was permitted but in england it wasn't so as the race was going on he was
36:50nudged by one or two americans they were then disqualified and the race had to be rerun the
36:56next day but the two americans refused so he actually had to run the race on his own the next
37:03day it's quite it's it's an unbelievable way to win a gold medal so it must have been actually a
37:08real
37:09disappointment when you win olympic gold medal but you win it because two people were disqualified and
37:15then you end up running the race on your own and i think that's actually what caused him to
37:20retire soon afterwards yeah but the amazing thing is why i say he was a game changer because he
37:26actually changed racing because after that and the controversy that happened that's why today races of
37:32this distance are run in lanes ah that's the reason so what did he do once he'd retired from running
37:39went back to being a soldier and can came this first world war out he went and sadly got killed
37:45in
37:461915. wow going to the front going back to the medal what's lovely one is the condition this is all
37:53original finish on here and then you turn it over and you can just see the detail in it but
38:00then
38:01around the collar you've got the name there lieutenant windham haswell
38:08winner 400 meters and so with something like this you've got a value of three to three and a
38:16half thousand pounds something in that region yeah for the gold value when you add in the story
38:22i would say an auction estimate you're going to be at twenty to thirty thousand
38:29oh yeah that does surprise me yeah to have that in your family yeah it's just truly remarkable thank
38:38you it's a pleasure
38:43as well as the olympics the precursor of the paralympics began in britain in 1948 at the stoke
38:49mandeville hospital this trailblazing event would go on to inspire the first global paralympic games
38:56in 1960 held in rome back at the stone x stadium there's an incredible collection of olympic and
39:05paralympic memorabilia including a section of the track from london 2012. here our expert siobhan
39:12tyrrell is with athlete kaz walton who attended some of the earliest paralympian games with items from an
39:19incredible career kaz walton obe i cannot get my head around how many sports you're involved in it's
39:31almost too many to count really but um swimming table tennis fencing basketball but the reasoning was
39:40because in the early days there just wasn't enough money to fund the teams where you had athletes doing
39:50individual events so you either did two three or even four events at a games or you weren't selected
39:58and it was as simple as that i'd eat and breathe paralympics really and we can see that with the
40:04medals that we've got here of all the gold medals that i won at paralympic games they were all important
40:11but i guess the first and the last one that i won just stand out a little bit for me
40:18so of the first
40:19two from tokyo in 1964 and the last one from seoul in 1988 and you've got a japanese doll here
40:29what's
40:30what's that all about the first paralympic games is recognized as rome in 1960 and they were still
40:37exploring what they thought we could take part in how much the our bodies would be able to endure sadly
40:45so the first ever track events were actually held in 1964 and they were only 60 meters i won the
40:55first
40:55ever women's track event and got presented with the doll who's absolutely beautiful that was a privilege
41:05and i remember watching the 2012 london paralympics it was when really paralympics sort of burst onto
41:13the scene and it looked as plush and as well presented as the olympics it was an absolutely huge step
41:21change for paralympic sport we've never had those sort of crowd phenomenal isn't it absolutely it makes
41:27me emotional just just talking about it and the and the coverage that we got too that was a first
41:34uh and the criticism that we got when we didn't do well in the sport which annoyed me to start
41:41with
41:41and then i thought actually that that's a quality absolutely competing at the highest level can be a
41:55solitary business with years spent training often alone so to share that journey with someone can make
42:01all the difference we were contacted by an olympian couple swimmer anita porter then lonsborough and
42:10cyclist hugh porter in 1964 they both traveled to the tokyo games to compete on the plane over they met
42:18and fell for each other at this stage anita was already an olympic champion having won gold in the 200
42:25meter breaststroke in 1960 while hugh was more of an up-and-comer we caught up with them at wilverhampton
42:32mayor's parlour which now stores all of hugh's medals to hear the story of that journey that changed their
42:38lives most of the people were sleeping on the plane or trying to sleep we were all sitting in any
42:45different
42:45sports and the swimmers were at the back and i was the only one of the team that couldn't sleep
42:50i saw
42:51on on the right were the modern pentathlon boys who i'd met four years earlier so i stayed talking to
42:58them and then the cyclists started introducing themselves and joining the conversation and that's
43:05how i met hugh and um i was about to go back to to my seat and they invited me
43:10to join him for breakfast
43:12i played that played an ass there didn't i he's me sitting there with this aquatic megastar that's
43:17just about won everything and got more gold than fort knox and i'm sort of pouring out the
43:23disappointment of the year after the previous year and she lovely yorkshire lass is finding all the right
43:28words to encourage me and say you know getting it right and all that and we just sort of got
43:34on well
43:34didn't we yes sadly for both of them 1964 would not be their year hugh caught a cold which cost
43:43him a
43:43podium place and anita struggled in what would be her last olympic games i'd lost my fighting spirit
43:51and and unfortunately i just faded down and finished seventh but i still broke my british record so
43:58were you seven i thought you were fifth seven seven oh an unusual position for you darling yes yes
44:07hugh would then go on to win four world championships in the 5000 meter individual
44:11pursuit their impressive medal hall finally crowned with matching mbes i suppose i was playing a bit of
44:18catch-up really because when i met this uh superstar she had all these trophies and everything yes i got
44:24mine 10 years before huey thank you for that but i'm still younger than him
44:32it's very very important when you're competing at the ultimate level in sport
44:37uh your partner has got to understand the demands and what's required i remember one christmas um
44:44no don't tell him
44:47he obviously wanted to train and was it snow or rain christmas day i think and he kept pouring with
44:53rain didn't
44:53yes and so i got the turkey in the oven and then it stopped raining so he said i must
44:58go out so out
45:00came the turkey then it stopped again so you got so the poor turkey then mentioned you'd get cooked
45:07it's been fabulous you've had some super times haven't we have a lot of laughs yes we have
45:11it's been fabulous you've had a lot of fun and it's been a lot of fun and it's been a
45:20lot of fun
45:20every olympic games leaves behind a legacy stadiums velodromes and hopefully a generation of new
45:27athletes oh come on
45:34and in 1984 one athlete's dedication would go on to inspire thousands
45:42when tessa sanderson broke the olympic record for the javelin in los angeles
45:46she became the first black woman from britain to win gold in a track and field event
45:53back at craven cottage i was able to sit down with her to go through some of her cherished items
45:58and she came dressed for the occasion tessa take us back to that moment in 1984 when you walked up
46:06onto that podium to get your gold medal what was it like it was the greatest sporting moment of my
46:13life
46:14the feeling was like having a house lifted off your head i was not the person that was featured to
46:21win in the games because of course there was this big rivalry between you know my british colleague and
46:26myself i was right you and fatima whitbread yeah fatima whitbread the moment that javelin left my hand
46:33in the first round first throw i knew it felt good and i just thought when it landed i thought
46:39get that
46:40you lot now it was a great feeling when you came back after standing on that podium
46:48what was that like you know my heart was racing because you know you finally felt i've done it
46:53i've actually won the biggest crown in sporting history and then from that i went back to wensfield
46:59in wolverhampton where i'd lived for a while and my family was there and they had a bus that took
47:03me
47:03up to the castle pub where my dad used to sort of drink my dad was one of my biggest
47:07fans and the
47:09feeling was just so euphoric you just never forget look you've brought along some items you're wearing
47:15your 1984 tracks looking great in it short in the legs now come on you are rocking it tessa we've
47:23got
47:23your medal when i came back all the kids out there who wanted to see it and things like that
47:29and the
47:29schools that were writing in and say can we see your medal i thought let me do that because when
47:34i was
47:34young i'd love an iconic person to have come in and seen me in the school so i remember once
47:40i went to
47:40leeds to do a pa and i brought it up there and the kids came rushing at me like this
47:46and i said then
47:47i was going oh yeah hello kids but they grabbed the medal i was just there nothing to them dropped
47:53the medal and dented it and i think it's the only medal that thought it's got a little dent look
47:58there oh on the side but and their faces like that doesn't matter here's the gold medal you can
48:05touch my medal absolutely fine i get more fun seeing it being worn and being looked at and touched
48:12and then what about these spoons what's the story with these i love this this was the first eight nations
48:18games they're so special because it's got all the flags that i've never seen that
48:23and when i have my kids my adopted twins now i thought i'd give them a little feed
48:28and then polish it and put it back but it's pretty special because i think there's only been two
48:34eight nations games nine in 78 and then there was one in 82 and i love it i love them
48:40you mentioned
48:41fatima whitbread i remember watching both of you you know on television your sporting prowess what was
48:48that rivalry like the rivalry was one of the best things i think that happened for me in track and
48:53field because it kept me on my toes and hopefully kept her on her toes and i think it was
48:59really good
48:59to have that all the time i kept on thinking well i want to beat you whenever i do and
49:06as the first black
49:08woman to win a gold medal in track and field yeah i mean did you feel the weight of that
49:13at the time
49:14was that significant for you i didn't feel that until afterwards it's been 41 years this year since
49:20i've won and so nobody male or female has ever won olympics thrown gold medal for great britain but as
49:27a
49:27black woman going out there and coming back with this later on i did feel i'm carrying a lot of
49:35this on my shoulder yes because i want to inspire a lot more black girls to come forward it's not
49:41about
49:41you know the racism or racism that we're having it's about creating this pathway if i can do it
49:48you can have a go too you know let's not doubt ourselves here's confidence here's a little way
49:54forward take it grab it use it even if it's not sport use it in the way that i've done
50:06we remain at craven cottage for our final story another of pioneering sports women
50:13at the turn of the 20th century women's football was enormously popular with tens of thousands of
50:19people attending matches but in 1921 the football association declared that football is quite
50:26unsuitable for females and banned women from playing
50:32the one drawback to this otherwise idyllic picture of young maidens at play
50:37is that strictly speaking they're outlawed by the parent body the football association
50:43the ban remained in place for decades and even when it was lifted generations of women were shut
50:48out the men who coach these girls risk suspension from their own clubs if the fa hears about them
50:54dallying with ladies football teams in 1971 against the wishes of the fa a group of players
51:01traveled to mexico to take part in an unsanctioned women's world cup
51:08our expert siobhan tyrrell met with three women to hear the story of this tournament
51:13which showed how popular the sport could be again you ladies have brought some football memorabilia in
51:19today can you explain who you are and then what this event was i'm leah caleb and i was a
51:25player
51:26fortunate to go to mexico in 1971 to play in the women's world cup hi i'm jillian sale and i
51:33also played in
51:34that world cup um at the age of 14. my name is jean williams and i'm a historian of sport
51:40and i've
51:41written a lot about this particular event there was a ban on women's football in england from 1921
51:48until 1970 and very shortly after that ban is overturned we have players going out to a women's
51:56world cup in mexico and this event was actually not accepted by the football association was it
52:05no so the fa overturned the ban in 1970 but they didn't want to take control of women's football
52:12so it was an amateur organization called the women's football association that ran women's
52:17football at the time so you're there in mexico you're you're young teenagers what did it feel
52:23like what reception did you get when you turned up at mexico city it was out of this world really
52:29after playing in front of a few people at home on park pitches and to fly into mexico city and
52:36we
52:36didn't realize exactly what the enormity of it would be um we played in front of 90 000 95 000
52:43and it was photographers tv and the crowds were just amazing we were felt like celebrities it must
52:53have been mind-blowing you brought some items here leah tell us what the bag is so we have the
52:58bag this
52:58was given to all the players and here we have the program of the actual tournament the mascot on the
53:06front is sochityl and i was 13 and i had dark hair like sochityl and they used to call me
53:12sochityl
53:13which was rather sweet and this is actually jill's yeah that photograph was taken at the training
53:19ground in mexico um so yeah obviously i was 14 then and the medal is is what we were presented
53:26with who were you playing against what were your matches argentina and mexico and we played with
53:31against france as well and leah what's this so that is a shirt that i wore in the aztec stadium
53:38it was
53:39very basic it was going to be hot over in mexico our other shirts we wore in england would have
53:44been
53:45far too heavy they were bought hand-stitched numbers on so you finished playing football you
53:52got on the plane you flew into heathrow and i'm guessing there were a whole load of celebratory
53:59journalists there no no there was absolutely no interest in us coming back the conversation just
54:09wasn't there and we actually received bands the players uh three months for us that were 16 and
54:17under and six months for those over did your football career carry on after the ban either of
54:23you both of us i carried on playing till i was 32 some of the players didn't we fortunately played
54:29together um but we didn't speak of of the world cup even our teammates didn't even know we'd been to
54:36mexico i think we felt we'd done something wrong because when we came back we were banned and gene
54:42i know that you have been instrumental in highlighting these generations of of female players you know
54:50you took these ladies here to see the lionesses to explain the history what did you tell them
54:58we met with the lionesses at rockcliffe hall in the february before the women's euros in 2022 and i
55:07basically said to the current lionesses don't wait 50 years to tell your story because we know that
55:13these players have been shamed into being quiet it was really great the way that the players embraced
55:18it i have to say it's nice that the players don't think that there's any demarcation between official
55:25and unofficial it's a complete nonsense the current crop of players are standing on the shoulders of
55:31giants and they absolutely recognize that and i think it's a really exciting time for women's sport
55:38really there's an absolute desire for collecting this area it's only going to go up and up in value
55:44so it's a really difficult thing for me to value so i always revert to what would i pay for
55:50it so
55:51collectively you're probably looking at about 10 15 000 pounds i'd say plus plus plus it's just going
55:59to keep going up and up and up yeah but it's been an absolute pleasure to meet you ladies keep
56:06telling
56:06your stories we want to hear it thank you thank you
56:27recently interest in women's sport has ballooned in the year after the lionesses euros win in 2022
56:33almost one and a half thousand new women's football teams were founded
56:39and over 80 000 packed into wembley stadium to see the red roses lift the rugby world cup in 2025
56:47the history of sports in britain is one of small beginnings leading to global gains
56:54from ancient pastimes slowly morphing into the sports we know today
56:59the invention of one victorian eccentric spreading across the world
57:06it feels like we're living through a new sporting boom here in britain this time particularly
57:10in women's sports and who knows maybe decades from now we'll be back here in this very spot celebrating
57:17this very moment for now from the antiques photo in this special sporting program bye-bye
57:24is
57:26and
57:40so
57:51so
Comments