Page 88 - All Shapes & Zebras From Treorchy

Eventually, they may ride off into the sunset, choosing not to return for preseason. Some may be usurped, like fallen kings who could not keep on battling time - and younger players - forever. Others, may simply be claimed by injury...
Whichever way it comes about, the club and team, when a player leaves, will never be the same. A changing room has to evolve with their retirement – both figuratively and literally. Spaces on changing room benches become available where once only a certain player was permitted to sit. Younger teammates, who may have looked up to the said player, are required to fill the vacuum, to take up the mantle and the cycle continues.
A recurring theme of rugby union, it follows life in general and, as always, time waits for no man. Many loyal and committed veterans actually give the club a wide berth after retirement: it’s a fine line between calling it a day and thinking you can play on for one more season; staying away from the club removes or blunts any temptation to go back. Eventually though, like homing pigeons, most will return to the club, to share stories and tall tales of past glory days. Some end up coaching or managing; others sit on committees, undertaking enjoyable new roles within the club as they mellow with age.
Now and again, there’ll sometimes be the odd veterans’ game where they can don the club colours once again and attempt to turn back the clock. But attempt is the operative word. With the risk of getting too philosophical and existential, one day we all return home from playing a match, drop the kit bag by the washing machine and never go back out on to the pitches competitively again. At the time, it may be argued that some veterans won’t appreciate the profound significance of this act until after the fact. But what did TS Eliot say earlier? “Mixing memory and desire,” - now that’s a metaphor for a rugby veteran’s longing for the past.
Youth, as they say, is indeed wasted on the young...
86 ALL SHAPES & ZEBRAS FROM TREORCHY