When the battle scars have faded and the truth becomes a lie and the weekend smell of liniment could almost make you cry.
When the last ruck’s well behind you and the man that ran now walks
It doesn’t matter who you are the mirror sometimes talks
Have a good hard look old son! The melon’s not that great
The snoz that takes a sharp turn sideways used to be dead straight
You’re an advert for arthritis, you’re a thoroughbred gone lame
Then you ask yourself the question why the hell you played the game?

Was there logic in the head knocks? In the corks and in the cuts?
Did common sense get pushed aside? By manliness and guts?
Do you sometimes sit and wonder why your time would often pass
In a tangled mess of bodies with your head up someone’s ass?
With a thumb hooked up your nostril scratching gently on your brain
And an overgrown Neanderthal rejoicing in your pain!
Mate - you must recall the jersey that was shredded into rags
Then the soothing sting of Dettol on a back engraved with tags!
It’s almost worth admitting though with some degree of shame
That your wife was right in asking why the hell you played the game?

Why you’d always rock home legless like a cow on roller skates
After drinking at the clubhouse with your low down drunken mates
Then you’d wake up - check your wallet not a solitary coin
Drink Berocca by the bucket throw an ice pack on your groin
Copping Sunday morning sermons about boozers being losers
While you limped like Quazimodo with a half a thousand bruises!
Yes - an urge to hug the porcelain and curse sambucca’s name
Would always pose the question why the hell you played the game!

And yet with every wound re-opened as you grimly reminisce it
Comes the most compelling feeling yet god, you bloody miss it!
From the first time that you laced a boot and tightened every stud
That virus known as ‘rugby’ has been living in your blood
When you dreamt it; when you played it all the rest took second fiddle
Now you’re standing on the sideline but your heart’s still in the middle
And no matter where you travel you can take it as expected
There will always be a breed of people hopelessly infected
If there’s a teammate, then you’ll find him like a gravitating force
With a common understanding and a beer or three, of course
And as you stand there telling lies like it was yesterday old friend
You’ll know that if you had the chance you’d do it all again
You see – that is the thing with rugby it will always be the same
And that, I guarantee is why the hell you played the game!