Golf was declared "Britain's dullest sport" after a survey revealed that 70% of people "found it boring to watch," according to Rick Broadbent of the LONDON TIMES. The YouGov survey of 1,616 adults revealed that Britons "regard athletics as the most exciting sport," followed by tennis and football, with rugby union and gymnastics completing the top five. They were the only ones with a positive rating -- with the other 12 sports in the survey deemed "more boring than exciting." Golfer Matthew Southgate said, "I probably agree with them. The coverage needs to be better. Unless you know the rules and the players, it can be difficult to watch." George Bernard Shaw once opined that cricket was invented to provide "a sense of eternity," and it was judged the third-most boring sport, along with darts, after golf and American football. Snooker completed the bottom five while "geographical differences found that rugby league is regarded as more exciting than rugby union only by northerners, while golf is considered most thrilling in Scotland" (LONDON TIMES, 1/10).