This article considers the responsibility for schoolboys' behaviour and character when in liminal spaces between home and school, in an historical account of the annual cricket matches in London between Eton, Harrow and Winchester in the late 1850s. The episode is situated in the context of the Clarendon Commission's discussions on school sports, parental and school authority, and "muscular Christianity" in the early 1860s. Set in the conceptual framework of late-nineteenth-century manliness and masculinity, the article suggests an enduring attachment to pursuits of the mind rather than the body amongst masters, and points to a greater role for parents (particularly fathers) and boys themselves in the rise of athleticism in schools than is usually granted by historians. The article outlines the limits of school authority "in loco parentis", and calls for a reinterpretation of the history of muscular Christianity and its relationship with the public schools. (Contains 49 notes.)