Sharp share price movements are meat and drink to Angus Campbell, the 28-year old head of sales at Finspreads, and in his spare time he sends a ball moving violently around a fives court.

For the uninitiated, fives is about the most esoteric sport around. If you didn't go to Eton, Harrow or one of the other members of a charmed circle of English public schools, then you probably won't have learned its arcane arts.

Over to Campbell: "It's something I learnt at my prep school Sunningdale in Berkshire. There were Eton fives courts there. There is also something called Rugby fives but Eton fives courts have a buttress and angles on the walls because it was invented by boys at Eton who started playing it in the school chapel."

Campbell, who went from Sunningdale to Stowe, is a member of the Old Stoics fives club, which consists of around 30 people and plays either at the new public courts in west London or at one of the capital's fives playing schools.

"There are some courts at Westway leisure centre under the A40 and at Westminster School," he says. "It's very easy to get a court because not many people play."

" I describe fives as squah with your hands. You wear gloves and use a cork and rubber ball that can bounce quite high and if you have four good players it can be immensely quick. The court is about the size of a squash court and there's a lot of turning, ducking and crouching."

So why is it called fives? Campbell says: "I've always thought it was because there are four players and one ball." Another theory refers to the phrase "a bunch of fives", but nobody knows for sure.

Interview by City AM May 2006
Created: 3 April 2007 by Mike Fenn
efa@etonfives.co.uk

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