World Badminton Champion Hopes for Intercollegiate League in That Sport

Harvard should take the lead in promoting badminton as a collegiate sport, asserted Jack Purcell, world's badminton champion, yesterday.

"I expect to see in the near future," he said, "an intercollegiate badminton league which will include besides Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, the Canadian universities of Toronto and McGill." The only obstacle that is holding this up at present, in his opinion, is the lack of facilities for play in college gymnasiums which are used constantly in winter for basketball.

Purcell, who has been playing for 10 or 11 years, was Canadian champion in 1929-30 and English champion in 1931. Since 1932, when he was declared a professional because of certain newspaper articles, he has never been beaten, having defeated the leading stars in Canada, England, and the United States.

Badminton, according to the champion, is the most exhausting of any racquet game, far more so than tennis or squash. He explained that it is an extremely tiring sport, being an overhead game entirely, with no chance for stalling.

"For football players in the summer. I can see no better way of keeping them trim than by playing badminton," Purcell stated. "It is one of the most perfect conditioners available for wind and for legs. I know many professional football and hockey stars who play constantly to Keep in condition."

Purcell would invite to a game those who scoff at badminton as a "non" sport. "I could have them flat on their backs and gasping for breath in a few minutes," he exclaimed. He feels, however, that this attitude will soon be gone, and the game will be as popular here as it is in Canada and England.