BOB CASEY DIARY:I believe that for the most part professional rugby players conduct themselves well off the pitch and I'd hate to think that image could be ruined by a minority.
RUGBY HAS commandeered more column inches in the news rather than sports pages in the last fortnight, unwelcome attention that will hopefully be a glitch rather than becoming a trend. I’d hate to see scandal become more prevalent in the sport – taking rugby closer to its soccer sibling in terms of off-field antics.
In recent weeks the instances of rugby players making headlines for the wrong reasons has increased appreciably. There’s the Andy Powell fracas in the Walkabout pub in Shepherd’s Bush, Gavin Henson’s suspension for fighting, Danny Cipriani filching a bottle of vodka in a nightclub and two separate incidents in which Wales and Cardiff secondrow Bradley Davies and Northampton Saints and England fullback Ben Foden were cautioned by the police.
When I was starting off, rugby had just embraced professionalism but remnants of the amateur ethos were still very much in evidence. My introduction to senior rugby probably coincided with last orders in the drinking culture. We were club players essentially who were moving into a province orientated set-up. As a young man, being paid to play a sport that you love and having plenty of free time to boot had a significant up side in a social capacity.
Those days bear no resemblance to the current regimen of a professional rugby player. As young players we took our example from the older generation, all products of the amateur era. The held down jobs, made time to train and play and after matches, depending on the result, celebrated or drowned their sorrows.
I remember the young guys co-ordinating nights out. If we had a Wednesday off, then we would get together on the Tuesday for a session. Those “midweek blowouts” were great but short-lived. Drinking pints just isn’t conducive to being in tip-top shape physically and mentally and the older you get the more that resonates.
After a Saturday night out I can safely say it would be Tuesday before I was firing on all cylinders again. Professionalism ultimately educated us on the folly of regular alcohol consumption and the debilitating effects it had on your system. We came to understand there had to be fundamental changes to lifestyle.
Players make sacrifices to pursue a career they love but that social austerity and temperance has a flip side: the risk of binge drinking. If players are given a window of opportunity to drink alcohol once a month for example, most are going to embrace the occasion with gusto. Irregular consumption means that tolerance levels can be low and that combined with volume can be a lethal cocktail.
If you amend your lifestyle in terms of diet, socialising, etc, it’s a human reaction to make the most of nights where the constraints are removed. Most players wouldn’t drink at all as opposed to having the occasional pint or two, saving it up for a night out.
When the public think of carousing rugby players, images of big, boisterous, beer-swilling, song-singing loudmouths would probably represent a consensus in terms of opinion. In the old days they would take over the clubhouse or a local pub where they would be known to the landlord. Those are safe havens for players.
It’s when they step outside that environment that the potential for problems arises. Rugby players can make for intimidating clientele as they are bigger, louder and take up more space than the average punter and tend to socialise in large groups for the reasons outlined earlier on. They don’t mind a bit of jostling or tomfoolery.
Many are recognisable to the general public, some viewed as celebrities and while most of the attention is polite, well meaning and essentially flattering, that’s not always the case late at night in a pub. Not being recognised can have a down side too.
The fracas involving Andy Powell and Tim Payne is a case in point. They were in the Walkabout pub in Shepherd’s Bush watching QPR and Derby on the television when Powell indulged in a bit of “banter” with some QPR fans. He was attacked by 10 of them, knocked unconscious with a bar stool to the back of the head and Payne was forced to throw his body on top of his team-mate to stop the unconscious Powell from getting even more of a kicking.
The QPR fans will wear that notoriety like a badge of honour. They don’t care about size and given the right numerical advantage will embrace the challenge. That’s why it is important to choose your environment on a night out. You don’t want to put yourself in that situation. If you examine the majority of the incidents involving rugby players recently, most have occurred when a player has broken off from the main group.
The collective dynamic often acts as a safety valve. Generally there’s a hierarchy involved within the group where the older players would keep an eye on the younger lads on the basis that anyone who gets a little too loud, messy or plain obnoxious would be spoken to or put in a taxi. They are refereed to as the social hand-grenades.
A recent report written by James Pitts, the chief executive officer of the Odyssey Rehab Centre in Sydney, highlighted the problems of drugs and alcohol in the NRL (rugby league). I believe for the most part professional rugby players conduct themselves well off the pitch and I’d hate to think that image could be ruined by a minority.
It’s not case of being holier than thou; those who know me will vouch for my love of pints. However players must have a duty of care to the image of the sport.
The hoary old cliché about it being a hooligan’s sport played by gentlemen still carries some resonance in that we go out on the pitch, tear lumps out of each other and afterwards share a pint in the bar.
These days though, there is an increasing emphasis on carefully choosing the location where you share that pint.
