Friday Night Lights

For most, the competitive sport they play in their school years will be the best sport of their lives. For some, it will be the best days of their life, period. This is where they reach levels or recognition, respect, acceptance and achievement that are never matched again. This is nothing new; maybe it's human nature to place these people on a pedestal. And high school sport has always been a pressing issue, especially in the USA.

Friday Night Lights is now the seminal expose of High School sport. The book by H.G. Bissinger became a film and then a TV series. But is raises many issues and questions about teenage sport. The fact that over 10,000 people will turn up on a Friday night to watch a bunch of 17 year olds represent their school is amazing. Over here, it's an alien concept. But the same principles still apply, simply on a smaller scale, over here. But then again, that's like most things.

The pressure placed on the players of the Permian Panthers is immense. We might like to think we're under pressure but in reality we place it upon ourselves.

And that's the thing. There is an odd desire for teenage players, particularly in team sports, to be watched, to be pressured. The bigger the crowd the better.

For some, being part of something like a successful sports team is everything. Due to the equalising nature of a team, they become valued. Around school, they achieve a status that without the team they would never have. And that is why we see parents living their dreams through their sons. They recognise that they were the best days of their lives and they want them back.

Like India, schools have a caste system. The classic stereotype is that the 'Jocks' run the school. This is true but the reasons for it are hard to pin down. Maybe these boys are the most assertive, confident boys and so they play sport. Or maybe sport turns them into the most confident. Maybe it's because they are physically better than their counterparts.

But when they leave school they become just like anyone else. Life has an entirely different system and in Friday Night Lights the amount that the players put into their short-lived sporting careers has an incredibly negative effect on the rest of their lives. There are parallels here with the UK and my experience. At the time, the match on a Saturday is the most important thing in their lives. And that winning feeling is so often worth it.

But the UK jock is some way from the US high school stereotypes. Yes, certain privileges exist and a certain social rank is achieved. But most of this is internally created because of the buzz and lift that it gives any 17 year old. In the book, film and TV series the pressure was external and many of the team struggled to deal with it. The whole community had very little going for it except a prize American Football Team. The place was defined by its exploits on a Friday night. So the community put everything into those matches.

In this country, efforts are made by the players to turn themselves into the centre of the community (usually the school community). It's human nature, they want to be valued. But this internal pressure, the making of posters, the drives to get as many people down to watch are not coming from staff or parents.

Friday Night Lights is a fascinating insight into the world of the high school sportsman. Read it, watch it. It shocks and amazes in equal measure and offers a warning into what can happen when external pressure gets out of hand.

Toulouse Rugby

Written while watching Toulouse v. Harlequins in the Heineken Cup on 17th January 2010.

If there is one club in the whole world I would like to play for, it is Toulouse. Ever since I have watched rugby they have been the one side who can consistently produce magic over the years. Always having had a soft spot for the player who can produce something from nothing, with the spark of individuality, players such as Jean Baptiste Elissalde, Freddie Michalak and Cedric Heymans have always led me to sit down and gawp. As I write, the newest addition to this band of runners, which includes the enigmatic Clement Poitrenaud, Maxime Medard, has finished off a sumptuous try. But the way in which such a culture, a winning and entertaining culture, develops is fascinating to me. Obviously all the players, from 1 to 15 have the skills but the same can be said for most teams at the highest level. There exists an attitude, an idea of how they want to play the game which must exist on the training ground.

They also have the swagger to pull it off. Where other teams would resort to the boot, they come off a right foot and set off on an arcing run, breaking half-tackles and offloading with reckless abandon. The enjoyment is obvious for all to see. Too often in some teams one player has the cojones to stamp his talent on the game but his teammates are left trailing in the same dust his opposition are. With this band of mainly Frenchmen but also a gaggle of South Sea Islanders and Tri Nations Missionaries, there seems to be some sort of connection where the default setting is to play.

It's also worth noting the impact of a player like Yannick Jauzion. Without his huge frame taking Toulouse forward over the years, the space nor the platform would have been created to allow the flyers to fly.

It doesn't happen every week, so often the Gallic shrug intervenes which says "we just don't fancy it today" and this simply makes them more exciting to watch. They can turn it on and off, playing with the humble spectator.

So I hope Toulouse continue to threaten in the Heineken Cup this year so we can all enjoy their exotic brand of je ne sais pas right to the final because it is this sort of rugby that should be rewarded with trophies, especially in a game which is moving away from the players Toulouse like to employ.