Have never really liked him but quite liked the programme, and one burning issue re Charlton came out of it.....seems Theo introduced the Millwall players to paying for their own food at the Training Ground on the basis that normal working people would have to pay at their staff canteen....this makes sense to me.
Do Charlton have the same thing in place at Sparrows Lane and if so is it the players that are not paying the caterors rather than the club ;-)
I quite like him. Sure he's a bit of an arrogant prick, but everything he's got he's got off his own back.
Isn't it "bat" ? Off your own bat ?
Origin
One question that often gets asked on this website about the figurative expression 'off his own bat' is "should that be 'off his own back'"? Well no, it shouldn't. 'Off your own back' originated as a mishearing of the former expression. It has gained sufficient currency to be considered as a viable everyday alternative of the correct version, but purists dismiss it as a straightforward error.
Bats come in many forms of course and, as is always the case with such words when they occur in phrases where the context clear, the meaning is open to fanciful interpretations. So, as with the yards in 'the whole nine yards', which are guessed to be any number of things, the 'bat' in 'off his own bat' has been said to be one of these: the flying mammal, a butter pat, a tool used in brickmaking etc, etc. In fact, the bat in question is a cricket bat and the first activity that was said to be done 'off someone's own bat' was to score runs.
The first citation of 'off his own bat' in print comes from the pen of the celebrated cricket historian and statistician Henry Thomas Waghorn, in Cricket Scores, 1742:
"The bets on the Slendon man's head that he got 40 notches off his own bat were lost."
The 'Slendon man' was probably Richard Newland, the star of the Slindon Cricket Club and cricket's first great all-rounder.
It is worth noting that the phrase is found in print several times during the next century and all of the known citations are explicit cricket references - the other supposed derivations of 'bat' in this context owe everything to imagination and nothing to evidence. There's an example in Our Village: Sketches of Rural Character and Scenery, by Mary Russell Mitford, 1824:
"William Grey got forty notches off his own bat; and that brilliant hitter Tom Coper gained eight from two successive balls."
Why runs that were scored 'off someone's own bat' were worth mentioning derives from the arcane rules of cricket. Runs, which were often referred to as 'notches' in early references to the game, may be scored in cricket in several different ways. These include various forms of 'extra' runs, for example, bowling misdemeanours like wides or no balls; various forms of 'bye', in which the batsmen run without first hitting the ball; and overthrows, where a fielder throws the ball at the wicket and misses, giving time for the batsmen to run again. All of these are counted towards the batting side's score, but it is the runs that a batsman scores 'off his own bat' that gain kudos for the player.
The first usage of 'off his own bat' as a figurative, i.e. non-cricket, phrase is in Fragment on Irish Affairs by the Rev. Sydney Smith, May 1845:
"Dr. Hodgson is a very worthy, amiable man... but [I] suppose he had no revenues but what he got off his own bat."
Yes originally the expression was "bat" but has been changed by common parlance to also be "back".
In my opinion the common usage of both mean that both are acceptable expressions which mean the same thing. Language changes and evolves and English is pretty much the greatest of all languages for embracing change. "Off his own back" is just as plausible for an expression meaning "doing something alone without help from anyone else", as the original expression.
There are some famous changes in phrases which have had a much greater impact than the "bat" to "back" issue.
One of them I recall was a translation of the Hebrew in a very early version of the Gospels where the word for "young woman" in respect of Mary, was arguably mis-translated as a similar word meaning "virgin". I still think scholars are arguing over that one!
One funny moment was when he purposely broke that child's case on wheels that you see everywhere at airports nowadays - supposedly to prove how useless they were. But I could walk into Rymans and easily break all the pens they sell - what would that prove?.
Quiz question - the answer was in a match programme article years ago by Colin Cameron - what is the connection with one of the people in the programme and Charlton?
Have never really liked him but quite liked the programme, and one burning issue re Charlton came out of it.....seems Theo introduced the Millwall players to paying for their own food at the Training Ground on the basis that normal working people would have to pay at their staff canteen....this makes sense to me.
Do Charlton have the same thing in place at Sparrows Lane and if so is it the players that are not paying the caterors rather than the club ;-)
That's taking things too far, if the club wants the players to eat healthily and decides to have a canteen serving healthy food then its a bit much charging the players for it too.
I quite like him. Sure he's a bit of an arrogant prick, but everything he's got he's got off his own back.
Isn't it "bat" ? Off your own bat ?
Origin
One question that often gets asked on this website about the figurative expression 'off his own bat' is "should that be 'off his own back'"? Well no, it shouldn't. 'Off your own back' originated as a mishearing of the former expression. It has gained sufficient currency to be considered as a viable everyday alternative of the correct version, but purists dismiss it as a straightforward error.
Bats come in many forms of course and, as is always the case with such words when they occur in phrases where the context clear, the meaning is open to fanciful interpretations. So, as with the yards in 'the whole nine yards', which are guessed to be any number of things, the 'bat' in 'off his own bat' has been said to be one of these: the flying mammal, a butter pat, a tool used in brickmaking etc, etc. In fact, the bat in question is a cricket bat and the first activity that was said to be done 'off someone's own bat' was to score runs.
The first citation of 'off his own bat' in print comes from the pen of the celebrated cricket historian and statistician Henry Thomas Waghorn, in Cricket Scores, 1742:
"The bets on the Slendon man's head that he got 40 notches off his own bat were lost."
The 'Slendon man' was probably Richard Newland, the star of the Slindon Cricket Club and cricket's first great all-rounder.
It is worth noting that the phrase is found in print several times during the next century and all of the known citations are explicit cricket references - the other supposed derivations of 'bat' in this context owe everything to imagination and nothing to evidence. There's an example in Our Village: Sketches of Rural Character and Scenery, by Mary Russell Mitford, 1824:
"William Grey got forty notches off his own bat; and that brilliant hitter Tom Coper gained eight from two successive balls."
Why runs that were scored 'off someone's own bat' were worth mentioning derives from the arcane rules of cricket. Runs, which were often referred to as 'notches' in early references to the game, may be scored in cricket in several different ways. These include various forms of 'extra' runs, for example, bowling misdemeanours like wides or no balls; various forms of 'bye', in which the batsmen run without first hitting the ball; and overthrows, where a fielder throws the ball at the wicket and misses, giving time for the batsmen to run again. All of these are counted towards the batting side's score, but it is the runs that a batsman scores 'off his own bat' that gain kudos for the player.
The first usage of 'off his own bat' as a figurative, i.e. non-cricket, phrase is in Fragment on Irish Affairs by the Rev. Sydney Smith, May 1845:
"Dr. Hodgson is a very worthy, amiable man... but [I] suppose he had no revenues but what he got off his own bat."
Wow. You did all that for Iil ol me?!
Still, as bing says, both are commonly used and most people u dear stand what is meant.
Have never really liked him but quite liked the programme, and one burning issue re Charlton came out of it.....seems Theo introduced the Millwall players to paying for their own food at the Training Ground on the basis that normal working people would have to pay at their staff canteen....this makes sense to me.
Do Charlton have the same thing in place at Sparrows Lane and if so is it the players that are not paying the caterors rather than the club ;-)
That's taking things too far, if the club wants the players to eat healthily and decides to have a canteen serving healthy food then its a bit much charging the players for it too.
Why is it? My work are always banging on about eating heathly food but don't buy me lunch every day.
Comments
Do Charlton have the same thing in place at Sparrows Lane and if so is it the players that are not paying the caterors rather than the club ;-)
Origin
One question that often gets asked on this website about the figurative expression 'off his own bat' is "should that be 'off his own back'"? Well no, it shouldn't. 'Off your own back' originated as a mishearing of the former expression. It has gained sufficient currency to be considered as a viable everyday alternative of the correct version, but purists dismiss it as a straightforward error.
Bats come in many forms of course and, as is always the case with such words when they occur in phrases where the context clear, the meaning is open to fanciful interpretations. So, as with the yards in 'the whole nine yards', which are guessed to be any number of things, the 'bat' in 'off his own bat' has been said to be one of these: the flying mammal, a butter pat, a tool used in brickmaking etc, etc. In fact, the bat in question is a cricket bat and the first activity that was said to be done 'off someone's own bat' was to score runs.
The first citation of 'off his own bat' in print comes from the pen of the celebrated cricket historian and statistician Henry Thomas Waghorn, in Cricket Scores, 1742:
"The bets on the Slendon man's head that he got 40 notches off his own bat were lost."
The 'Slendon man' was probably Richard Newland, the star of the Slindon Cricket Club and cricket's first great all-rounder.
It is worth noting that the phrase is found in print several times during the next century and all of the known citations are explicit cricket references - the other supposed derivations of 'bat' in this context owe everything to imagination and nothing to evidence. There's an example in Our Village: Sketches of Rural Character and Scenery, by Mary Russell Mitford, 1824:
"William Grey got forty notches off his own bat; and that brilliant hitter Tom Coper gained eight from two successive balls."
Why runs that were scored 'off someone's own bat' were worth mentioning derives from the arcane rules of cricket. Runs, which were often referred to as 'notches' in early references to the game, may be scored in cricket in several different ways. These include various forms of 'extra' runs, for example, bowling misdemeanours like wides or no balls; various forms of 'bye', in which the batsmen run without first hitting the ball; and overthrows, where a fielder throws the ball at the wicket and misses, giving time for the batsmen to run again. All of these are counted towards the batting side's score, but it is the runs that a batsman scores 'off his own bat' that gain kudos for the player.
The first usage of 'off his own bat' as a figurative, i.e. non-cricket, phrase is in Fragment on Irish Affairs by the Rev. Sydney Smith, May 1845:
"Dr. Hodgson is a very worthy, amiable man... but [I] suppose he had no revenues but what he got off his own bat."
In my opinion the common usage of both mean that both are acceptable expressions which mean the same thing. Language changes and evolves and English is pretty much the greatest of all languages for embracing change. "Off his own back" is just as plausible for an expression meaning "doing something alone without help from anyone else", as the original expression.
There are some famous changes in phrases which have had a much greater impact than the "bat" to "back" issue.
One of them I recall was a translation of the Hebrew in a very early version of the Gospels where the word for "young woman" in respect of Mary, was arguably mis-translated as a similar word meaning "virgin". I still think scholars are arguing over that one!
Still, as bing says, both are commonly used and most people u dear stand what is meant.