See play the man and not the ball in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
Download JSON data for play the man and not the ball meaning in English (3.7kB)
{
"forms": [
{
"form": "plays the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "playing the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "played the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "played the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "play the man and not the ball (third-person singular simple present plays the man and not the ball, present participle playing the man and not the ball, simple past and past participle played the man and not the ball)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "topical",
"langcode": "en",
"name": "Sports",
"orig": "en:Sports",
"parents": [
"Human activity",
"Human behaviour",
"Human",
"All topics",
"Fundamental"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"_dis": "68 32",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w+disamb"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To attack an opponent instead of attacking the ball, which is usually being controlled by the attacked player at the time."
],
"id": "en-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball-en-verb-3GcFZVKP",
"links": [
[
"sports",
"sports"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(sports) To attack an opponent instead of attacking the ball, which is usually being controlled by the attacked player at the time."
],
"related": [
{
"_dis1": "81 19",
"word": "don't hate the player, hate the game"
},
{
"_dis1": "81 19",
"word": "play the ball and not the man"
},
{
"_dis1": "81 19",
"word": "bet the jockey, not the horse"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"_dis1": "69 31",
"word": "play the man"
},
{
"_dis1": "69 31",
"word": "play the man, not the ball"
},
{
"_dis1": "69 31",
"word": "play the man not the ball"
}
],
"topics": [
"hobbies",
"lifestyle",
"sports"
]
},
{
"categories": [],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "2010 April 1, “Abbott denies trying to soften his image”, in The Sydney Morning Herald, retrieved 2018-08-27",
"text": "\"\"What we are seeing is an orchestrated campaign from the Labor Party to try to play the man and not the ball,\" he said... \"[And] this is the kind of personal attack that we are going to see from the Labor Party right up until polling day.\"\"",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2018 August 14, Katharine Murphy, Amy Remeikis, “Australian senator calls for 'final solution to immigration problem'”, in The Guardian, retrieved 2018-08-27",
"text": "\"“Claims that the words meant anything other than the “ultimate solution” to any political question is always a popular vote are simply ridiculous,” Anning said... “As I called for a plebiscite on the immigration mix, this baseless and ridiculous criticism is simply an effort to play the man and not the ball”.\"",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To object to someone's argument by attacking them or a facet of their personality instead of the argument itself; to make an ad hominem attack."
],
"id": "en-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball-en-verb-Mhrq03Jf",
"links": [
[
"ad hominem",
"ad hominem"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(by extension, idiomatic, colloquial) To object to someone's argument by attacking them or a facet of their personality instead of the argument itself; to make an ad hominem attack."
],
"tags": [
"broadly",
"colloquial",
"idiomatic"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "En-au-play the man and not the ball.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/2f/En-au-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball.ogg/En-au-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/En-au-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "play the man and not the ball"
}
{
"categories": [
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English terms with audio links",
"English verbs"
],
"forms": [
{
"form": "plays the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "playing the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "played the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "played the man and not the ball",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "play the man and not the ball (third-person singular simple present plays the man and not the ball, present participle playing the man and not the ball, simple past and past participle played the man and not the ball)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"related": [
{
"word": "don't hate the player, hate the game"
},
{
"word": "play the ball and not the man"
},
{
"word": "bet the jockey, not the horse"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"en:Sports"
],
"glosses": [
"To attack an opponent instead of attacking the ball, which is usually being controlled by the attacked player at the time."
],
"links": [
[
"sports",
"sports"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(sports) To attack an opponent instead of attacking the ball, which is usually being controlled by the attacked player at the time."
],
"topics": [
"hobbies",
"lifestyle",
"sports"
]
},
{
"categories": [
"English colloquialisms",
"English idioms",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "2010 April 1, “Abbott denies trying to soften his image”, in The Sydney Morning Herald, retrieved 2018-08-27",
"text": "\"\"What we are seeing is an orchestrated campaign from the Labor Party to try to play the man and not the ball,\" he said... \"[And] this is the kind of personal attack that we are going to see from the Labor Party right up until polling day.\"\"",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2018 August 14, Katharine Murphy, Amy Remeikis, “Australian senator calls for 'final solution to immigration problem'”, in The Guardian, retrieved 2018-08-27",
"text": "\"“Claims that the words meant anything other than the “ultimate solution” to any political question is always a popular vote are simply ridiculous,” Anning said... “As I called for a plebiscite on the immigration mix, this baseless and ridiculous criticism is simply an effort to play the man and not the ball”.\"",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To object to someone's argument by attacking them or a facet of their personality instead of the argument itself; to make an ad hominem attack."
],
"links": [
[
"ad hominem",
"ad hominem"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(by extension, idiomatic, colloquial) To object to someone's argument by attacking them or a facet of their personality instead of the argument itself; to make an ad hominem attack."
],
"tags": [
"broadly",
"colloquial",
"idiomatic"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "En-au-play the man and not the ball.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/2f/En-au-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball.ogg/En-au-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/En-au-play_the_man_and_not_the_ball.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "play the man"
},
{
"word": "play the man, not the ball"
},
{
"word": "play the man not the ball"
}
],
"word": "play the man and not the ball"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-04-24 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-04-21 using wiktextract (82c8ff9 and f4967a5). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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