Page 41 - zebra_proof

There’ll always be hard luck stories and near misses in sport - and you can’t play sport without losing, but those agonising losses genuinely leave players feeling empty and numb for some time. It is only a game of course, but for those 80 minutes on a Saturday, many a player feels that the pitch on which the game is played is the centre of the earth; what happens on that patch of grass is the only thing that matters in that moment.
The changing rooms after such games are quiet places to say the least. If a final or, heaven forbid, a derby match has been lost in such circumstances, then the aver- age changing room would make some morgues resemble Swansea’s Wind Street on a Saturday night by comparison. If there’s been an inexplicable stroke of bad luck or a great injustice done by the hands of a referee, the post-match post-mortem may have more animation and angst, but the injury inflicted by the result will still take time to heal and many a door will be slammed on a Saturday evening in frustration. Some players may be able to have their shower and let the feeling of defeat wash away down the drain. Many others can’t, and the dark clouds of defeat will stay with them for a spell.
But of course, losing rugby matches, as painful as it is, makes winning them all the more sweeter. It’s a necessary evil, no matter how unpalatable they are...
ALL SHAPES & ZEBRAS FROM TREORCHY 41