The wide-open field makes the spectacle look all the more surreal, like an urban commuter crush transplanted to the countryside, only there's no obvious reason for the rough-and-tumble.
The men are surrounded by acres of empty space; if they wanted to, they could just stop and quietly disperse, without any need for crushing against each other.
At one point, the players have to negotiate a muddy ledge onto a lower section of the field.
The drop's only eight inches, but it might as well be 80 feet. There's no way the Sway is going down it without falling over; the men would stand a better chance of landing on their feet if they jumped off a cliff.
The mud around the ledge is unbelievably sticky, a mix of earth, clay and superglue, so that their legs get locked into the claggy soil while people are still pushing from the outside in both directions and inevitably—MAN DOON! MAN DOON!—the Sway collapses over the dividing line, bodies sprawled on both sides.
After much negotiation, the boggins break the stalemate by hoisting the Hood—or rather, the men attached to the Hood—past the breaking point.
Then it falls over again.
A little guy is ripped out of the body pile and hauled off, his legs dragging in the mud.
From the way the boggins are handling him, it looks like he's a troublemaker about to get a taste of rough justice: Don't you ever (thump!) come here (thwack!) again!
Instead, the boggins drop his limp body on the field.
He's passed out, coated in mud except where his shirt's been pulled up, exposing the white, fish-belly skin of his stomach.
A St. John's Ambulance official huddles over him, cocking his head to get some air into his lungs.
Eventually, the guy's eyelids flutter to life, and he staggers to his feet like a discombobulated wino straight from the gutter.
His hair is spiked and matted around his skull, his clothes are rumpled helter-skelter and his eyeballs are red and rolling in different directions.
The right one even has a blotch of blood next to the pupil. He's been squeezed until his eyes popped!
Rather than going home or to the hospital, though, he hangs around the sidelines, waiting for another chance to jump in the Sway.
For Stephen Mitchell (initials: S&M), getting knocked down and out is all part of the fun.
"Oh, I got trampled on, yeah," he tells me. "Oh, without a doubt. Me 'ips aren't feelin' too clever at the minute… I'm bound to get a bollocking off me family because they know I need a hip replacement."
"What?"
"The bones are crumblin'."
At 34, he has chronic arthritis in both hips.
"So why on earth do you do this?"
He pauses, then grins wildly. "It's the 'Ood—ya can't explain it. It's the 'Ood!"
©J.R. Daeschner
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