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GOD'S OWN SPORT Switching on my car radio to a Five Live phone-in show this morning I caught the end of a call from a Scot who was driving back to his birthland, in which he referred to Scotland as 'God's own country'. I have no argument with his opinion as a large proportion of Scotland is as splendid and picturesque a land as you could wish to find, although it must be said that when God was creating the part of it from which the caller hailed, Glasgow, He must have been having a bad day.      The next caller on the programme was a man with something to say about Rugby League. No doubt having heard the previous call, and scavenging from it, he immediately referred to Rugby League as 'God's own sport'. Pardon? Rugby League? The caller here was talking about the second most boring sport ever invented, and I include Ludo and tiddlywinks. God, having come up with things like tempest, storm, whirlwinds, thunder and lightning, lands of milk and honey, famine, pestilence, Mount Everest, the Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls, Sex, and sexually transmitted diseases including syphillis and AIDS, when He was creating the world, could by no stretch of the imagination be called boring, and it is inconceivable that if asked to choose His own sport it would be one as sleep-inducing as Rugby League.      Let's take a look at this sport that is so exciting that apart from the one exception of the Challenge Cup Final it attracts crowds of up to twenty. Basically what happens is that a player from Team A runs with the ball in the general direction of the opposition's line until he is tackled by a player from Team B. The player from Team A then works the ball back to a team mate who picks it up and runs with it until he is tackled by a player from Team B. The player from team A then works the ball back to a team mate who then picks it up and runs with it until... etcetera, etcetera. This happens five times, and after the fifth tackle the player from Team A kicks the ball up the field as far as he can. Ninety nine times out of a hundred it is fielded by a player from Team B, who then runs with it in the general direction of the opposition's line until he is tackled by a player from Team A. The player from Team B then works the ball back to a team mate, etcetera etcetera, for five times, and after the fifth tackle... etcetera etcetera. Eventually a player from Team A or Team B will cross the opposition's line and score. The ball then goes to the other side and the whole sorry pantomime begins another cycle.      Occasionally, but only to prove that he hasn't forgotten how to do it, a player will pass the ball sideways to another player. Anyone who has ever watched the game for any length of time - and five minutes is more than enough - will know that it is as predictable as sunshine in California and about as exciting as synchronised knitting. Its greatest fan used to be Eddie Waring, a nutter who also liked 'It's a Knockout'. Enough said.      The most boring sport, even more boring than Rugby League, is of course Basketball. Although usually played indoors, and on a much smaller pitch, Basketball is played in almost exactly the same way as Rugby League, except that the player running with the ball can't be tackled, thus eliminating from it the one bit of excitement to be found in Rugby League. For those of you lucky enough not to have been exposed to it, briefly what happens is that a player from Team A runs up the pitch with the ball, sometimes passing it to another player from Team A, then one of them throws it into Team B's net. Team B then take possession of the ball and run up the pitch with it, sometimes passing it to each other, and one of them throws it into Team A's net. Then Team A take possession of the ball, etcetera, etcetera. Occasionally Team A or Team B run up the pitch with the ball and don't throw the ball into their opponents net, and in this way a result is obtained, otherwise every match would finish 92-92. (Some matches do)      Basketball is an ideal game for anyone not having sufficient skill to take part in proper sports such as Rugby Union and Football, or at least it would be if it wasn't for the fact that it can only be played with any degree of success by people who are over seven feet tall, who a century ago would have been able to find gainful employment only as a street lamplighters or as exhibits in freak shows.      Motor racing is the third most boring sport, in addition to it being a load of shite.