From almost swallowing the Snitch to waving a boneless arm, Harry has been bashed, boshed and beaten throughout the Quidditch seasons and matches, even the ones he wasn’t playing in. Here are some of the reasons Quidditch wasn’t always kind to poor Harry.
Quidditch tried to choke him
Harry found out that there were 700 ways of committing a Quidditch foul (World Cup, 1473, all in one match) and that Seekers tend to have the most serious accidents. Armed with this worrying knowledge, he stepped onto the field for this first ever match in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone and, halfway through, his broom went crazy. Nerve-wracking shenanigans and plenty of audience gasps later, the broom calmed down thanks to Hermione’s quick thinking. But Harry, apparently determined to uphold the Seeker accident tradition, decided to catch the Snitch with his mouth…
Harry was speeding towards the ground when the crowd saw him clap his hand to his mouth as though he was about to be sick – he hit the pitch on all fours – coughed – and something gold fell into his hand.
‘I’ve got the Snitch!’ he shouted, waving it above his head, and the game ended in complete confusion.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
It left him bludgeoned and battered
In Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the match between Gryffindor and Slytherin saw Harry fend off an enchanted (and very cranky) Bludger. He spent most of the game trying to dodge the giant black ball in the heavily falling rain, until he got distracted…
For an agonising moment, Harry hung in mid-air, not daring to speed towards Malfoy in case he looked up and saw the Snitch.
WHAM!
He had stayed still a second too long. The Bludger had hit him at last, smashed into his elbow, and Harry felt his arm break. Dimly, dazed by the searing pain in his arm, he slid sideways on his rain-drenched broom, one knee still crooked over it, his right arm dangling useless at his side.
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
He got to wave his boneless arm in the air…
Unfortunately for Harry, that same match saw the inept Professor Lockhart come to his (ahem) rescue. Waving his wand around and assuring everyone of his brilliance, he promised Harry he could fix the arm broken by the Bludger.
As Harry got to his feet, he felt strangely lopsided. Taking a deep breath he looked down at his right side. What he saw nearly made him pass out again.
Poking out of the end of his robes was what looked like a thick, flesh-coloured rubber glove. He tried to move his fingers. Nothing happened.
Lockhart hadn’t mended Harry’s bones. He had removed them.
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
And he was almost killed by Dementors
When it came to the first Quidditch match of the season in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban Harry was back on the field against Hufflepuff. The weather was awful, but something even worse was secreted away in the icy cold rain…
At least a hundred Dementors, their hidden faces pointing up at him, were standing below. It was as though freezing water was rising in his chest, cutting at his insides. And then he heard it again ... someone was screaming, screaming inside his head ... a woman ...
‘Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry!’
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
It tried to get him even when he wasn’t playing
The Quidditch World Cup was a source of massive excitement for Harry and Ron, especially since Arthur Weasley had secured tickets in the Top Box for the final match. Everyone loved every minute, but once again Quidditch packed a punch when the Dark Mark caused chaos and Harry and his friends nearly got blasted by a spate of Stunning Spells:
Harry whirled around, and in a split second, he registered one fact: each of these wizards had his wand out, and every wand was pointing right at himself, Ron and Hermione. Without pausing to think, he yelled, ‘DUCK!’ He seized the other two and pulled them down onto the ground.
‘STUPEFY!’ roared twenty voices – there was a blinding series of flashes and Harry felt the hair on his head ripple as though a powerful wind had swept the clearing.
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Sometimes it was members of his own team…
In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Harry was forced to put McLaggen into Ron’s place as Keeper in the match against Hufflepuff. This wasn’t a very good idea.
Sure enough, McLaggen, for reasons best known to himself, had pulled Peakes’s bat from him and appeared to be demonstrating how to hit a Bludger towards an oncoming Cadwallader.
‘Will you give him back his bat and get back to the goalposts!’ roared Harry, pelting towards McLaggen just as McLaggen took a ferocious swipe at the Bludger and mis-hit it.
A blinding, sickening pain … a flash of light … distant screams … and the sensation of falling down a long tunnel …
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince