ABSTRACT
The change in attitude was evident in two other key areas: the formation of the Sportsmen's Battalions, and patriotic events. The Sportsmen's Battalions, probably modelled on English equivalents, were attempts to provide a special focus for athletes wanting to join the AlE While the shared masculine nature of athletic activities and war fuelled the conflict over spectator sports, the same link in an alternative context was utilized to attract recruits. Most commonly stressed was the belief in the efficacy of sport for war:
[Football] teaches him to play the game for his club with pluck, good temper, and no shirking. It teaches obedience to the rules, obedience to your captain. It teaches a man to play in his place, to back up and play hard not for his own glorification but wholly and solely that his side may win. The war is showing day by day the effect of this teaching.88
