Granting, then, that conditions at the university in question are favorable, that the scholarship of the left-over candidates and veterans is all that could be desired, and that the system in use is supported adequately, the first serious football move is made in the spring when the more promising material is called out for practice of a light order. For this work the men should be lightly clad, as there is to be no scrimmaging. They should have prepared themselves by getting in good enough condition so that the head coach and the captain will be enabled to get a fair idea of their speed and activity. Of course it is too much to expect that the big men of the squad will be down to actual football weight, and allowance will have to be made for this, but it will not hurt the candidates for the backfield and for the ends to do a little early track work in order to tune up in speed and quick starting.

The bulk of the work will consist of kicking, passing and catching kicks - general handling of the ball - running down the field, quick starting, and walking and trotting through the simpler formations. New men will thus have a chance to work off their natural awkwardness. A football is one of the most difficult things in the world to handle, and under the rules that have been built up since the open game came into existence there are innumerable occasions upon which it must be handled like a baseball. The great fault of most teams that have failed in the last ten years has been poor handling of the ball, and practice in this department of the game should be never-ending. Almost every man, especially the forward who cornea out for football, has a natural tendency to "fight the ball" and he should be taught to overcome this in spring practice if possible. There is so much to do after the season opens that it is a handicap to the coaches when they have to go back to the beginning and teach their men how to handle the ball all over again. The period of spring practice is not too early to begin to teach the candidates that fumbling a loose ball is a crime and missing a punt a sin. It may be objected by their elders that these terms are a little harsh for faults connected with a mere game, but the answer is that a certain amount of exaggeration is necessary in an appeal to the husky young man in his second or third year in the university, and that he takes his other college activities quite as seriously. There is no reason, then, why football should suffer any more than the fraternity, the class, or indeed the class room. Undergraduate life is, rightly or wrongly, one of enthusiasms, and the rewards and punishments of the gridiron are established accordingly.

In the course of this same spring practice it would be well if some enthusiastic graduate could be prevailed upon to give prizes for punting, drop-kicking and forward passing, taking account both of accuracy and distance. It is never too early to uncover a kicker and forward passer, and the attractions of competitive athletics ought to be a part of football as early and as often as possible.

In working up the simple formations it would be well to give the veterans their old places at once. They are heroes to the undergraduate, and should remain so until some newcomer bowls them from their pedestals. There is one other matter in which many coaches err, and that is in placing a greenhorn alongside a veteran instead of using an experienced man from the second eleven. It is better to group all the experience in one set of men and all the inexperience in the other. The greenhorn will then have an opportunity to watch the veterans at work and will not have to make a show of himself in public and perhaps lose a friend through clumsily stepping all over the old-timer, who is not particularly enamored of that sort of thing.

Simple signals should be evolved at once, and the men taught to run through formations from signal. Indeed, the chief value of this early practice, beyond giving the coach and captain a line on the material, and emphasizing the value of clean handling of the ball, lies in the opportunity it affords of getting the less experienced players to feel at home on the field, individually and as an eleven. Every encouragement should be given to the newcomers - in the hustle of fall work, when a great deal of hurried weeding out will have to be done, there will be less time for this sort of thing. Especially is this true of the promising kickers, who should be allowed to do their punting and drop-kicking in their own way, taking their own time, and even two steps if necessary. The fall is time enough for the polishing process.

By the time the spring practice is over there should be at least two tentative elevens in the field, thoroughly conversant with the rules, well under way in the matter of handling the ball, and sufficiently worked up as to enthusiasm to be willing to make almost any sacrifice in the hope of "making" the varsity team the following fall. It remains now only for the coach to keep the men at the point to which he has brought them, and to this end he should ask the candidates to keep in fair shape throughout the summer, handle a football during vacation with some degree of regularity, and return early in the fall, perhaps about a week before the university opens. The spring practice makes for better acquaintance and for a degree of mutual confidence not to be worked up in a hurry in the fall. When the university opens there is no time for introductions and exchanges of pleasantries, and it is well for the work of the team if the man trying for left tackle shall already have started up a friendship with the chap who is out for left end.

The spring practice is the first real step toward laying out the campaign; the second generally is taken some time in August, when the head coach, equipped with memoranda of the material at hand and data on such rule changes as may have been made, sits down to decide tentatively upon the style of game his men will be called upon to play. It may be that he has in his squad more weight than speed, or vice versa; that the men are husky and willing but not too quick mentally; or that they are small but extremely fast, brainy and aggressive. It is true, of course, that the fall practice will make some difference in his calculations, but as a rule be can be pretty sure in August what general style of play will be best suited to the available material.