Can We Have Our Balls Back, Please, By Julian Norridge

If you're bemused by the British mania for sport (watching rather than participating, of course), it is consoling to learn that this is nothing new. In 1824, a crowd of 30,000 watched the 77-round punch-up between Tom Spring and Jack Langan.

Norridge's brisk canter round games generated in these islands is packed with unsporting behaviour. Lord March, an early member of the Jockey Club, won £250,000 (often by dubious means), which he spent on sex. WG Grace once took three runs when a ball lodged in his shirt.