HARTY: I'm starting to get worried now

AS a postscript to last week's column about parental behaviour on the touchline at youth football, I was somewhat disappointed to read reports of the Thomas A'Becket Middle School athletics team being booed on winning the annual inter schools competition.

From the outset I will express an interest as both my children went through both the first and middle schools at the Becket and were very happy.

The school has an extensive catchment area and is one of the biggest in the town, so with that amount of children they will always have an advantage when it comes to sporting activities.

Couple that with the fact that in my time as a parent at the school, the extra-curricular activities on offer, both sporting and other, were superb.

But it's a fallacy if people say that the boos are born out of Becket winning every time. That is clearly not true. Yes, they have had an exceptional record in the athletics events, but even with my own son I can recall him playing in four football finals, under the expert coaching of Graham Hill, and only winning one.

Of course there was disappointment, and on one occasion they were a tad hard- done-by when the ref in a final played an extra five minutes by mistake and they conceded twice in that time. But every time, it was the privilege to represent the school that was the overriding theme.

I don't recall any booing or jeering when they lost from any set of parents, so if some now choose to mark success with a negative response, that saddens me.

Is the fat lady already at the Pease Pottage services on the M23, clearing her throat, and waiting to thumb a lift to the Withdean, to start her recital as the Albion