Roger Alton’s highlights from a magical year in sport

We don’t half take a lot for granted. We may look up to the Aussies, kowtow to the Americans and look on in awe at the Chinese, but we’re not doing too badly ourselves. To judge from the papers, we’re a nation of fatties who when not pigging out on Pringles on the sofa are waddling down the high street looking for drugs. But it turns out we’re pretty good at sport: cricket World Cup winners, rugby World Cup finalists, women’s football World Cup semi-finalists. It was English teams who contested the Champions League final, after two mesmerising semis when Liverpool thumped Barcelona and Spurs defeated Ajax in the last seconds of added time.

At home, Liverpool continue to dazzle under a charismatic manager who has made the Kop his own. Meanwhile the England football team are poised for next year’s European Championships — a youthful, diverse outfit who play with great charm and skill and are managed by a man who is an excellent ambassador for the game and the country. That’s a lot of quality teamwork all round.

So let me take you back a couple of hundred years or so. Do you ever wake up at night wondering what Dr Thomas Arnold would make of it all? Probably not, but if you do find yourself wide-eyed at 3 a.m. any time soon, it’s an exercise that could lull you back to sleep. Arnold was the headmaster of Rugby School from 1828-41 when team games at schools were actively encouraged. He was first and foremost an educationist but tolerated games as a diversion from the unruly behaviour, inspired by the French Revolution, that had become endemic in public schools. At least that hasn’t changed.