Like a married couple coming up with a practical division of tasks and chores, my co-editor Roger and I have come up with a practical division of sports. My half of the sports desk is the one cluttered with badminton and fencing reports, which mostly look like spreadsheets, and the odd football report, and if I find something rugby-related on there I ask Roger if it’s his and he misplaced it.
That’s not to say that I’m anti-rugby. Far from it. I’ve always had an admiration for the sport, and the players, who seem diligent and honest (give or take the occassional Bloodgate). I just tend to get frustrated thinking that they all fall over in a heap a bit too often, and then that all ends up being quite time-consuming.
Having said that, when I was handed my press pass for the Friday Night Lights event, I was uncontrollably excited. For a start, it sounds great. It sounds like the name of a great American sporting novel. Probably because it is. Also, press passes don’t come along every day, and this one was saving me £4.50, and it was on the end of a lanyard.
I envisaged sitting in one of those fancy press boxes, like Gary Lineker and the Alans on Match of the Day, and maybe sipping free champagne, and finally finding out what canapés are.
I had a slight, niggling doubt that I’d be stuck with a bunch of rugby fanatics, clumsily blagging my way through conversations about rugby. But I pushed that to the back of my mind and hopped on the bus to the stadium.
There was no press box for us, so I didn’t feel quite like Gary or the Alans, and there were no canapés, so I’m still in the dark on that one. What we did get though was a great matchday experience.
York Hornets opened up the showcase Roses event with some movements that if I tried, I’d never walk again. And then the brass band gave us a few toots to warm up the crowd. Then there were the pyrotechnics, which went off at the start, and then every time York scored. A great little touch. The atmosphere created by the fans was the most memorable; the pantomime boos and cheers, and the chants, which I probably shouldn’t repeat in printed press.
As for my limited knowledge of rugby, the only blagging I had to do was on the Vision live feed. My thought process went something like this: There’s fire! York must have scored! What happened? “Roger! What just happened?” On my other side was a veteran of Roses rugby, who explained every passage of play to me in such detail that I could only understand every other word he said. He suggested things for me to write on the live feed, and I couldn’t tell if they were serious suggestions or rugby jokes, so I generally erred on the side of caution with an ambiguous “yeahhhahaha” response.
Even I could tell that Lancaster had no idea how to handle the likes of Bugge, Weir and Mortimer. Being Lancashire-based, I had wondered if watching a Roses tournament might incite some sort of internal conflict, but as the boys put Lancaster out of sight in the second half, I couldn’t help but feel proud.
Afterwards we snuck into the VIP bar and had a celebratory pint. Having genuinely enjoyed a full game of rugby for the first time, I realised that the event had done exactly what Asfahani had wanted it to: everyone got together, everyone got behind their teams, and Roses rugby moved off campus and up to the next level.