The Inevitability of Impact

Rugby is a full contact physical sport. Anyone watching the game for the first time could be excused for wincing at the sheer force of the impacts. With the advances in training and fitness regimes, the modern player is also faster and more mobile than ever before. The harnessing of speed and force make for a dramatic spectacle, but also combine to create the shuddering impacts synonymous with the modern game.

Whilst researching the physical implications for players, particularly in youth sport or in development squads, I came across a fascinating article outlining a study in New Zealand looking at identifying signs of concussive injury. I was drawn to some of the statistics produced in the study. By using sensors attached to players and built into mouth guards, the researchers were able to accurately measure the number of impacts in a game and the G-force exerted in the impact. The results were revealing.

In one game, there were over 3000 impacts. The average impact was 22g. Given a fighter pilot can experience a force of around 9g, admittedly over a more prolonged period of time, the individual impacts in rugby are nonetheless quite remarkable. One recorded hit was over 200g. It almost seems impossible that players are regularly encountering physical forces that would normally be experienced in road traffic accidents. The remarkable thing is the physical resilience of players and for the record, how few concussions there actually were.  Now that's not to minimise the importance of looking for this type of injury and being aware for the sake of player safety. But it set me thinking. One thing is inevitable if you play rugby. You will experience knocks and have to take the impact.

Some of those impacts will take you down. Some will cause you pain. Others will require you to simply put your head down and press on, using all of your strength and stamina. Sound familiar?

There is another arena in which there is an inevitability that we will encounter impacts. Life. But as with the great sport if rugby, how we react to life's knocks will often determine the outcome of the passage of life we're experiencing. Some things take us down. Some things cause us pain. Others call for every reserve of strength or staying power for us to press through. Our response can be critical to how things turn out. When we get knocked down, we have a choice - to stay down or get back up regardless of what took us down. We may be different as a result of the impact, but we can chose to stay down or stand again. We may experience pain, but ours is the choice to let that pain forever define us or to allow it to become something that helps strengthen us for the next challenge. We may feel totally exhausted but ours is the choice to live depleted of our reserves or to shift our thinking to recognise that resilience, resistance work and recovery are essential elements for building strength and endurance.

The bible has an interesting observation, made by the man's man Jesus Christ. He had observed life over an extended period: working in a carpentry business, with all the demands of hitting deadlines, keeping customers satisfied, financing projects. He carried the social stigma of living in a small, rough town, that few people admired. He lived under harsh government regulation, with a though tax regime. He was the oldest in the family he was born into and carried the responsibility. When he set out to make a difference for people, he was looked on with a familiarity that was driven by envy and contempt for his lack of formal religious preparation. No wonder he said to his team "in this world"(the one we have described, the one we live in), "you will have trouble". It's as inevitable as the impacts in rugby. However, he followed that statement up with one that was as astonishing as his previous comment was inevitable: "I have overcome the world." In other words, I have a way of getting through this. A way of getting through these impacts. Whilst there is the undeniable forward look to his destiny at the cross, this man's man was saying there is a way to overcome the world and what it throws at you - by simply not letting it define who you are. You are not defined by your current circumstance, your background, ethnicity, perceived economic value - your definition is not external, it develops internally. Through the relationships that we build. Through the kind of men we become. Through the faith we extend beyond our own limitations. The man's man blew away the final limitation, opening up a way for all men to meet and be comfortable in the presence of their maker.

Whatever, life is throwing at us, has thrown or will ever throw - should never truly define us and  therefore ever truly defeat us. Experiences good, bad and ugly shape us, but true definition is forged through a faith with the friend of all men, who has taken the ultimate hit for us.

preparing for a new season?

Whatever level a team plays at, the run-in to the new season always feels like a shock to the system.  From the end of season to the point at which pre-season training starts, I think there has to be a specialised course that coaches and fitness trainers go on to discover the latest physical punishment techniques. Every pre-season seems to get worse, or is it something to do with the ageing process catching up!!

The physical demands of the sport of rugby are punishing in game situations, but the level of pain in training seems to increase year on year.  It's not as if we have suddenly become unfit from the end of the last season is it? Pre-season is a time for preparation and, as the saying goes, failing to prepare is preparing to fail.

The period before the start of a season is also a time of change and often a time of uncertainty. New players are coming in. Some of your old team mates have gone or retired. The coaching staff may have changed and you could be facing playing a completely different style of game. There could be new sponsors, different kit, even different facilities.  You will certainly be facing new teams following promotions and relegations even if you are in the same league. Nothing stays the same. Everything changes. Even the rules of the sport change from time to time. Change is inevitable. It's how we respond to change that prepares us for what comes next.

Making assumptions about the next season or about our place in the team or our going uninjured for the whole year can be a big mistake. I can remember the very first competitive game we played. A brand new team. Our opponents arrived and swaggered off their bus, buoyed by their teams results in previous years. We on the other hand had been kept firmly in place by our coach and had approached the game not knowing the team until the day before the match. We destroyed them 70-0 and that was in the days when a try was worth fewer points. It was a hard act to follow and the temptation to assume every match would be as easy was difficult to avoid. 

Toward the end of the pre-season, there is a sense of just wanting to get on with the campaign. But there is another hurdle to get over before the season can begin in earnest. Trials. Even though you have played for a team for a long time, you still have to go through the same process. New, fresh, younger up and coming players may have arrived on the scene. Everyone faces trials before the next season begins. The trials precede selection for the next season. 

It's tempting to want the start of a new season to simply roll on from the end of the last, but the new season will also have new challenges.

Life can be the same - physically and mentally demanding, change and uncertainty, making assumptions about what lies around the corner and well, full of trials. Life is also made up of seasons and those seasons do change and bring with them new challenges. A very wise man wrote in the bible in a book called Ecclesiastes - there is a time for everything, a season, everything fits in its place in its right season. How we respond determines what happens as those seasons turn. How we approach the trials will determine how we fare in the next season. 

Another great writer observed in a letter to a group of men called the Hebrews that there is one thing that doesn't change. In fact he was describing a person. The man's man Jesus Christ. Of him it was written: Jesus Christ - the same yesterday, today, forever. In other words in the middle of the demanding, the changing, the uncertain, the trials - he remains consistent in his approach and attitude towards us as men. What a great example of maintaining his composure as a man in the middle of change.  Change is difficult to accept sometimes, particularly if the impact of the change means we have to adapt or stop something to start something new. But as we approach a new season - in sport or in life, lets remember there is one who we can rely on to be totally consistent as a role model, as a mentor, but especially as a friend. The man's man Jesus Christ. 

As we face the challenge of a new season, lets meet the demands, the change, the uncertainty head on, not shying away from trial, but willing to press on in the knowledge that the trails qualify us for the next season and that we do not move forward alone. The man's man has already been there and wants to walk with us through to the other side.

When your game plan falls apart

I recently went to watch a rugby match in a local county league. The match had significance for a number of reasons:

•  it would potentially secure promotion for one of the teams
• I knew a couple of the guys playing in the match
• it was the first time in years I had watched minor league sport

The team I went to watch won the match and were promoted. However, as a spectacle, it was poor in quality and certainly wasn't a great advert for the game. Despite their clear technical and physical superiority, the promotion seekers somehow lost their focus. They spent large parts of the game commenting on the demerits of the referee and complaining. Once they had lost focus, their standards started to slide. The rapidly deteriorating quality of their decision making, made their opponents seem more competent. This boosted opposition confidence, which compounded the title chasers  problems and led to handling errors and mistakes. In the end, the team were arguing amongst themselves. Despite the scoreline, they were behaving like losers.

Now, you could rightly argue "they won". But for me, this game became an illustration of the importance of focusing on the right things and, doing those "right things" right. Despite the win, it was a shambolic game that could have been so much better. In short, it wasn't a very good advert for the game and had the potential to dissuade the neutral from engaging with the sport.  How often do we allow our standards to slip and descend into a caricature of what we should be? How do others perceive the faith we profess based on what they see of us?

As they lost focus, the volume of handling errors and poor decision making increased alarmingly. When we lose sight of the main thing, we begin to bring into sight things that either don't matter, are peripheral or are simply wrong.

Despite the team being capable of blowing the opposition away, the match started to slip away from them.  However, there was a pivotal moment that altered the outcome. The game needed someone to refocus. Someone had to take it back by the scruff of the neck. Someone had to ignore the crowd decrying every refereeing decision. Someone had to get the team playing the right game in the right areas of the field. Just as the game was about to descend into a farce, one player took things into his own hands and stepped up to take responsibility. His intervention made the difference. He refocused and changed the outcome of the game. In the end, the team ran out comfortable winners, but, it was a poor game and one that deserves to be forgotten.

I'm sure there are times we have just scraped through or have felt our approach has been poor. It's worth analysing what goes on when we take our eyes of the main thing. What causes us to shift focus? Offence? Decisions going against us? Jibes from the sidelines, even from people who are supposed to be supporting us? The intervention of other people into "our space"? Things not going to our exact game plan? We can be so easily distracted And we've seen what loss of focus can do.

At those times, its worth remembering that we can refocus.  The bible has some great advice: Run with perseverance the course marked out for you, keeping your eyes focused on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for joy set before him, endured.. In other words; if we have decided to be a follower, a disciple, one who runs after Jesus the trailblazer of our faith, we need to keep our eyes firmly fixed on him as our focus. Science has belatedly discovered that what we focus our minds on has a strong physiological impact.  The object of our focus impacts the neural pathways in our brains and actually influences our motor functioning ability. Putting it a different way, if we focus on the wrong things, then our game will fall apart! Conversely, focusing on the right thing and following the right lead...

The Wisdom of the Gate

The first time a rugby referee pinged me for not entering a phase of play "through the gate" totally confused me as a young player. I was playing in a match in the south west of England - a place noted for its countryside and farming communities. I knew I had been offside - that was why he'd blown the whistle. But as I retreated the 10 yards for conceeded a penalty, I thought to myself "bit odd refering to a gate, we're playing out in the open here."

After a few coaching sessions and starting to understand the laws of the game, I realised he was referring to the area at the back of a ruck where players have to be aware of an imaginary line. This line, denotes the point beyond which if you are not already in ruck you are offside. Its usually marked by the back foot of the player furthest back in the ruck. The offside line runs at right angles to another imaginary line which forms a rectangle around the group of players competing for the ball.

The gate to which my rural referee was referring is the part of the offside line, between the two sides of the rectangle or box. Ah ha, so now, there's a box on the pitch? Confused? Effectively imagine a rectagle on the pitch with players inside it, touching the sides and the ends - the end of the box is the only area through which a player can join the play. The gate.

No wonder the breakdown area is seen as one of the games grey areas. It is ususally the zone in which mose penalties are conceeded. It's because the phases of play represent the "margins" of a game. Here players are right at the edge of a phase of play or following a tackle are at the formative stages of a new phase of play. Getting to grips with abstract concepts, imaginary lines and boxes can be the difference between retaining and conceeding possession.

I guess life has its margins too. The times when we are at the conclusion of something, or we are just starting out on a new venture. We follow similar patterns as we form or develop relationships. There are crucial points at every stage of our experience at which if we get it right we can build momentum. If we get it wrong,  it can take us a long time to regain the ground we may have conceeded. It takes a lot longer to rebuild trust than the moments it takes to break it. There is it seems a great deal of wisdom in the concept of the gate - the right way to enter a conversation, a meeting, a relationship.

Using the gate to enter a ruck is not just a technical inconvenience - there are positive advantages to playing correctly:

• you can without hinderance or penalty add your weight and momentum to a forward drive
• you can do the same to halt an advancing drive by the opposition
• you can actually drive opposition players off the ball and back beyond the gain line to take ground
• your presence prevents opposition players "coming around the side" of the ruck once the ball is about to enter a new phase of play

Doing things the right way really does make a difference. Who wouldnt want to have momentum in business or in serving people or in a friendship or relationship?

I'm reminded of the man's man Jesus Christ when he said to the team gathered around him, "anyone who doesnt enter through the gate but climbs in some other way is up to no good". He was using the illustration of a gated pen, where the farming community kept the sheep, their livelihood safe.

But he wasn't only referring to protecting the livelihood of farmers. He went on to point out the importance of protecting what is valuable to us as individuals; having security for our thoughts, our emotions, the real you, the real me. He then said something unusual - "I am the gate" - whoever uses me as a gate in life, will be safe. Who wouldn't want to safeguard their thinking and actions - oh how often I let my thoughts run riot and then let them motivate my actions. I for one am glad that the man's man offers us a right way to enter life.

I think my rural referee was spot on with his call: you can only enter life properly through "the" gate. Maybe there is some merit in learning the wisdom of the gate?

The Tackle Count

"..You can't simply wait for the opposition to make a mistake to regain possession. You have to stop their progress and defend your ground and if you want to get the ball back, you have to tackle with an attack mindset.."

Physically demanding, requiring a sense of timing and technical skill, making a tackle in rugby union doesn't automatically give you possession of the ball. But making a good tackle will:

• stop or slow the advance of the opposition
• prevent encroachment into your territory
• set up the possibility of a turnover
• bring an opponent down

In life, we frequently talk about tackling issues head on in an attempt to resolve something, to make progress or clear a hurdle on our journey to reaching a goal. But hitting something head on can have consequences. I remember playing in one match against a team made up predominantly of coal miners - I decided to tackle one of their lock forwards head on. He was about 6 foot 5 inches tall (about 1.96m). Going down on one knee as he approached, I launched him over my shoulder - but he smashed my face in the process. I took him down but I paid the price. There are times when a more subtle approach is required and I guess that is true in life too. 

Here are a few key elements to tackling that are worth considering in the context of life, relationships, business, serving others:

• it sounds obvious, but unlike American football where blocking is legitimate, in rugby you can only tackle the player in possession of the ball - knowing what you are going to be tackling is pretty important, as we too often tackle the wrong things and frequently in the wrong order

• your line of approach and point of impact are key to an effective tackle - how we approach something and the point at which we engage are often fundamental to the outcome of our interactions

• you cannot tackle a player who is off the ground, you can't use a straight arm tackle, tackle a player too high or tip a player beyond the horizontal (spear tackles are illegal) - there are ways of handling people if we have to tackle important, sensitive or difficult issues.

All too often as men, we are prepared to commit to the physicality of the tackle on the field of play and in life scenarios, we all too readily fly into conflict situations. But there are some things in life that are even more important than the oval shaped ball. How often do we shy away from addressing relational issues? Alternatively, we fly into them in the same way we would tackle an opponent, when a more subtle approach is required.

Sometimes, making one tackle isn't enough. We can make a tackle and almost stand back in admiration at what we've just achieved, only to see our opponent get up and carry on or offload the ball to a team mate, exploiting a space we have failed to defend. Tackling is such an essential part of the game that to relent is like conceding a game. Recently, I looked into the number of tackles made during an 80 minute game of rugby and discovered some valuable insights.

In the 2011 Rugby World Cup quarter-final, Australia beat the South African springboks in a tough, physical encounter. It was a game in which the Aussies made an incredible 147 tackles. South Africa had the bulk of the possession, but the Wallabies were resolute in their game plan. Tackle after tackle. Tackle, get up, make another tackle. Sometimes two man tackling was required to pull down their giant opponents. 147 tackles.

Now something fascinating comes out of the stats when you look closer. Generally there is a correlation between the tackle count and the number of penalties conceded. In other words, in the contact area, players hold on, don't make an effort to roll away and commit an array of other offences. Match analysts tell us a penalty is conceded every 8.3 tackles. In the Aussie game, that ratio went out to one penalty for every 24.5 tackles. The Aussies only gave away 6 penalties in the entire match and only two were in potential points scoring positions for South Africa. In the second half the ratio was an astonishing 42.5 to 1 - only one penalty given away for every 42.5 tackles. One word summed up the approach that day. Discipline.

The tackle count - their commitment to halting the opposition with an attacking mindset and discipline - their level of concentration, physical courage in the contact area and game awareness won the day. What an illustration. Sometimes we have to get back up and keep tackling our way out of tight corners, whilst maintaining the discipline that prevents us from compromise; taking short cuts, perhaps bending the rules slightly, taking the law into our own hands, not quite being truthful in relationships - building the potential penalty count against our credibility.

Knowing how, when and what to tackle and having the commitment and discipline to work through issues could be the difference between conceding or regaining ground. 

Holding things together

Binding is the essential connection of two or more players in a rugby union game for the purpose of adding weight, momentum or drive in a set play. How we connect to each other and hold things together, can be the difference between winning and just falling short.

The most critical use of binding - locking onto another player - is in the scrum. The scrum is one of the ways of resetting play following an infringement. The eight forwards from each team lock together to create a single unit and vie for the ball, which is fed into the scrum between the two sets of players. The combined power of 8 players pushing in one direction can be impressive - however, there are times when the scrum breaks up or collapses, which is unsightly and potentially very dangerous from a player safety perspective.
There are very specific rules about binding in the scrum, which if breached aside from the safety angle will result in players being penalised, possession being lost and the potential for points to be conceded.

Inevitably in a highly charged competitive environment, teams and players will seek to gain advantage and will push the boundaries. The scrum is no exception, particularly in the front row - which is front line contact with the opposition. Often described as a dark art, serious scrummagers will try to turn, twist or bore into their opponents to gain advantage. Turning an opponents arm under his shoulder will result in an incorrect pushing position and could force him upwards or misdirect the shove coming from behind him. At its worse, players will twist a player down until the scrum collapses - this is both illegal and extremely dangerous. But enough of the negative aspects. Its fair to say that there are those that would try to undermine - but usually, it's because the fear being out-scrummaged and out-played.

By contrast, with the correct binding, the integrity of the scrum is retained as a unit and....if you bind together,  you stay together, you work together and you gain ground together.

Binding is also very important to the formation of a maul. That is when a player is held up in a tackle and is unable to go to ground. Other players moving into the play from an onside position may bind onto their player or players to gain momentum and drive the play forward.

So, binding together with another player:

• creates the basis of a team play
• ensures you are actually in play and in the game
• puts you at the heart of the game rather than the fringes
• ensures you're not isolated in an exposed position
• adds momentum to a set play
• adds momentum that can drive play forward
• creates an opportunity to cross the gain line and take ground

Quite a list from simply connecting onto another player properly and for a purpose.

The bible has several insights into the way we connect with others for purpose. It records simply: two are better than one. Who wouldn't concede that battling through on your own can be a lonely place sometimes. Paraphrasing the man's man Jesus Christ, he invited his followers to "bind yourself onto me and learn from my strategic approach to life - when you link to my strength and experience, its not all about the hard life syndrome, we can make it together". Paul, the great thinker, writer and follower of the man's man added that unity of approach to a task, service or living out life itself would ensure completion with purpose and momentum if we could bind together, (just like the scrum), with the bonds of peace or one mind.

Binding together is the connection that drives momentum in teams, relationships, businesses and in the service of others. It's the basis of team work that takes ground and makes things happen. It seems such a simple thing to talk about in the context of a game - how you are connected to another player - but where it becomes second nature, it can be the basis of victory. How and who are we connecting to?

Inglorious Moments

Come on, we've all had them. Something snaps inside and boom! I can remember very clearly one of my most "inglorious moments" in a rugby match. I was totally destroying the opposition number 6 beating him to every breakdown, tackling him when he was in possession and stripping the ball from him. I was having a great game. But I now only remember it for my "moment". The lad didn't like the fact that I was outplaying him. So using some very strong language, he said "if you do that again mate, I'll have you"....Crack! Wrong thing to say to me.

It was like someone had pressed a very big red button marked "how dare you accuse me!" Alarm bells, steam hooters, emergency buzzers and fog horns were sounding in my head. I said back to him "yeah? any day!" Well I thought I had said it. In fact, right in his face, I had shouted it so fiercely, the teams playing field hockey on a nearby pitch heard me and stopped to watch the action. I didn't think to stop and analyse what would happen next. It involved my fist and his face.

Since then I've done plenty of other things that I'm not proud of, using self defence or self preservation or anything as an excuse. All of them if I'm honest, inglorious moments. Off the field, my mind and my mouth have had their fair share of inglorious moments too. I doubt if I'm alone.

I know its no excuse, and we try to rationalize it, but in adrenaline fueled scenarios, where we are challenged by tiredness, physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually and events are moving at pace we can so easily:

• make a wrong assumption about the motivation behind an action
• retaliate if we are provoked - some people seem to know which big red button works
• feel aggrieved at a decision that goes against us
• feel falsely accused - oh boy do I know my rights
• feel manipulated, undermined or used
• totally lose all sense of objectivity
• seek out revenge - I "will" get my own back
• lose control and let a wild outburst or stupid action take over

Particularly as men, we can feel our competence or sense of masculinity has been challenged or questioned. Our judgement gets clouded and we become irrational and stop thinking clearly. Another classic response is to depersonalise or project blame away from ourselves. Our language becomes; "the" passage or play, "the" relationship, "the" bills, "the" marriage, "the" kids. The reality is it's my marriage, my relationship, my kid, my job and of course its my attitude. Actions have consequences - in a game, we can be sin binned, sent off or even reported to a citing commissioner. Off the field emotional wreckage hurts. Relationships can be damaged irreparably.

Being able to take an objective view and beginning to understand that my actions, attitudes and adrenaline fueled reactions have consequences is a good starting point to reducing the frequency of my inglorious moments. Over a long time of making mistakes, I have discovered that who I am privately tends to come out when I am under pressure. So, the more I work on the who I am and who I am becoming, when the pressure situation arises, my personal intensity and stress levels don't rise with it. Most of my inglorious moments have come when I haven't stopped to think. The reality is, even in the split second, we have a choice to make. Make no mistake, sometimes those choices are not easy to make, even though they are the right ones.

Rudyard Kipling put it this way "If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you, if you can trust yourself when all men doubt you but make allowance for their doubting too....then...you'll be a man my son".  The bible has a succinct way of expressing the same thought "a prudent man gives thought to his steps" - in other words, before you start down a particular road - think about where its going to lead to. It isn't weakness to take a step back and disengage with the inclination to raise a voice or a fist. Sure there are times when someone with passion has to speak out against injustice, but here we are dealing with the destructive side of personal volatility.

There is an interesting contrast in the bible account of a mob that descended on the man's man Jesus. He had been falsely accused. He had been betrayed by someone close to him. When the mob approached him to take him down, Peter one of those with Jesus, pulled out a weapon and injured a man before he was stopped from causing further damage. Sudden uncontrolled rage. By contrast, Jesus simply said "I am the one your looking for". Peter's response to the mob was anger and the mob's response to him was the same. Jesus' response was calmness under pressure. The mob's response was to literally fall back - the sheer presence of this man, his personal strength of character and integrity produced a reaction in them. We know he was arrested and tried in what was humanities own inglorious moment. But the ultimate victory was his because he showed by the choices he made under immense pressure who he truly was. I know what my reaction to the mob would have been - inglorious. But now, I am finally learning that I have a choice. And as I make that choice, I am no less of a man. In fact I become more of a man.

Men Need the Fight

Back in my playing days we were a mixed bunch of lads. Electricians, farmers, office workers, builders. But as soon as we pulled on the team shirt something happened. We became a team. The shirt is a great leveller. The cause is a great uniting force. There's something powerful when men unite for a common purpose. The physicality of the contact and the hits, the exertion in the scrum and driving mauls. The elation of making the tackle and turning over possession. The ecstasy or the agony at the final whistle - no matter the result we stood together. I have a feeling that whatever we did away for the game, we were better men for being part of something that required us to commit ourselves to others, to excel as individuals but acknowledge that it would take all 15 of us to prevail. We were better men having given something of ourselves to the fight. Men need the fight. But the fight needed men. Today I have to adjust to watching from fhe sidelines or coaching, but there is still enjoyment in the camaraderie and the banter on the touchline. But I still miss the hits, the physical tussles, making the tackles. Today it's a different fight. It's showing the way to the lads coming through, showing this generation the importance of the fight, how to engage as team,  how to excel firstly as men, then as players.  Men need the fight. The man's man Jesus Christ understands the importance and the longing of men to engage in the fight - he pulled together 12 guys from different backgrounds and set them on a course to change the world. He knew they would face tough opposition, criticism and open conflict. But there was a fight. The prize - the liberation of people contained by dead religion or the limitations of sad or inflicted circumstances or the cruelty of tyranny.  That early team were as different a bunch of lads as any rugby, soccer, baseball or football team, but they  were unified by the cause of "the" man.  Make no mistake, when they were asked to take up a cross and follow - they knew exactly what he was asking. But there is no gain without the fight. The great writer and follower of Christ, Paul, understood when he said to his young friend Timothy, fight the good fight of faith, lay hold of the life that really counts and will last beyond just our physical lifespan. He knew that men need the fight.  Men need the fight and perhaps as after the game, we may just be better men for engaging with the cause - better husbands, better fathers, sons, brothers, better friends. Better men. Men need the fight and....the fight needs men.