Football Explained

Agricultural Defending

The term first appeared in the mid-1930s and is credited to the robust Leeds centre back (and keen gardener) Percy Thrower. Thrower’s combative style would leave vast gouges in the Elland Road turf, riddling the final third with divots. With one goal too many coming from a vicious bobble, the big number 6 unified his twin passions and began wearing gardening gloves on matchdays.

On clearing his lines Thrower would quickly get himself aligned with the rest of the back four, and set to task repairing the scars left by his tackle. Thrower's most famous technique for keeping the Eland Road turf perfectly maintained was his pioneering scheme Grass Roots Football, which has produced several top gardeners including Alan Titchmarsh, and a succession of initially promising but ultimately average English centre forwards including Danny Cadamarteri. Although Thrower's unorthodox style was initially tolerated by the Leeds management he soon found himself languishing in the reserves after he played Stanley Matthews onside whilst tending his raspberry canes on the edge of the six yard box.

Although many of the methods died with Thrower in the late 1980s Agricultural Defending experienced a renaissance in the 1990s with the introduction of the sweeper system, with pruning and weeding being two of the position's core requirements. The practise of agricultural defending is expected to be boosted in the 2008/09 season thanks to a new FIFA ruling which will allow defenders to store secateurs in their shorts in muddy conditions.