Professional sport should never be divorced from morality, whatever Harlequins think
The Daily Telegraph, 19th August 2009
Has professionalism ever looked so macabre or pathetic? In the dying moments of a close match, Harlequins rugby club tried to cheat its way to victory by instructing its young winger Tom Williams to spit out a sachet of fake blood so that the “injured” Williams could be replaced with a specialist goal-kicker. Williams winked at a colleague as he left the field and the scheme was captured by television cameras.
But the original crime is outstripped by Harlequins’ cover-up. First Williams’s mouth was cut with a scalpel to make the injury look more genuine. Then the player, who was only following instructions, was abandoned to suffer a hefty fine and ban while the club protested its innocence.
First organised cheating, then mutilating your own player, finally pressurising him to carry the can. Has it come to this? That Harlequins, once a proudly amateur side in the most proudly amateur sport, should pursue the lowest elements of win-at-all-costs professionalism, and do it so amateurishly?
Perhaps the worst aspect of “Bloodgate” is the misguided view that such skulduggery is the inevitable result of professionalism. Some argue that Harlequins has simply been inept in its execution and is unlucky for getting caught.
It is true that faking injuries is widespread in many sports. When I was a cricket captain, it was once suggested to me by a figure in authority that we should substitute a fresher and better fielder in place of a bowler who had finished his allocated overs. When I said no, his look suggested that it was I, not he, who was breaking a professional code.
There are those who say that scalpels and sachets of fake blood are to be expected now that rugby has renounced its amateur ethos. I couldn’t disagree more. The idea that competing for big money makes cheating unavoidable is a pathetic way of letting modern sportsmen off the hook.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Golf has been fully professional for decades. And yet golfers don’t try to cheat opponents out of justified victories. Nor do its spectators, with the very occasional exception, stoop to the tribal hatred that courses like a poison through some other sporting crowds.
In this year’s Wimbledon final, Roger Federer and Andy Roddick were playing for the highest stakes. And yet their behaviour and dignity matched the standard of their tennis: there is no reason why professional excellence cannot be combined with gentlemanly grace.
That is the nub of the issue. It is too easy for fans to say: “Given all the money at stake, what do you expect?” Or for players to think: “Mustn’t judge – we would have done the same.” Or for administrators to argue: “We aren’t alone – look at other sports.” With each shrug of the shoulders, the latest decline is legitimised as part of the acceptable mainstream.
But sporting culture is not a binary system, in which we must chose between the pure amateur ideal and a cynical professional world. All sports are constantly in a state of flux, capable of self-improvement as well as self-abasement. There is nothing stopping sportsmen being more like Federer and less like Harlequins.
One fan can tell another to stop abusing the opposition; a coach can eschew cheating even if it makes his own tenure less secure; a player can say: “I’m not cut and I’m not bleeding.” The lesson we should draw from “Bloodgate” is not that sport is now inexorably divorced from morality, but quite the reverse. The battle for the future of sport is ongoing and never-ending. Which side are you on?