Why does everything have to revolve around 80 minutes on a Saturday afternoon? Why should we girls have to suffer because grown men want to prove that they are not really as old as they look or feel? The answer is beyond me but in an attempt to show the futility of his performances on the Rugby field I once noted how the week revolved around this black day.

Sunday 9 a.m. The matrimonial bed. "Aaaah ! Mind my shins with your toe nails !" Not "Good morning, darling" or "How are you?", just bloody self pity "Will you get the breakfast this morning? I'm not quite up to it today, I'll do it next week." Liar ! He says the same thing every weekend.

Woe betide the child who wants to play and who in all innocence puts an unsuspecting little foot on an equally little bruise and incurs the wrath and fury of a grown up child.

Sunday 10 a.m. He condescends to take breakfast. He hobbles in accentuating the limp, screwing up a faint black eye and breathing deeply. It really is too much. He would only need a Tricorn hat, a crutch and a parrot on his shoulder shouting "pieces of eight" to pass for Long John Silver. I'm never sure whether to give him sympathy or applause.

Sunday 12 noon. He must have a drink with the lads to go over the game lost or won yesterday. He kisses me goodbye. All aches and pains have disappeared for the time being, his black eye and limp have become medals to display in front of the unattached impressionable girls at the local. He is able to shrug off pain like a 'young' lion in front of the lionesses. The bastard.

Sunday 3 p.m. He returns, grumbles an apology for being late, wallops his Sunday dinner and falls asleep in the chair all in the space of half an hour. God ! How the world revolves around him. Children walk in stocking feet for fear of waking him. He won't wake until tea-time, it's probably better that way.

Monday a.m. It’s always rush, rush in any household on a Monday morning but how many wives have to start looking or clean kit and pumps for training in the gym. He flies out shouting "Have you put my jock-strap in?" How could anyone forget his jock-strap ?

Monday p.m. (very late). Our hero returns home. This time it's sore feet or skinned shins, muttering something about Tom being as awkward as a clog dancer with two left feet and ought not to be allowed in the gym. Having had a few drinks afterwards he becomes very talkative and demonstrative - not towards me — naturally - but towards his naked self in the mirror. Conversation between the two goes something like this. "God! this training is good for you, I must have lost a lot of weight since the last time I looked (last Monday)". This 14 stone weakling flexes his muscles and crawls into bed to dream about that great rugby field in the sky.

Tuesday. Anticlimax day - he begins to act like a human being again.

Wednesday. The selection card arrives. Has he been dropped? No-one dare look at the card before him. Good news - he has not been dropped.

Thursday. All is quiet.

Friday. Tension rises, he's beginning to think about the tries he's going to score. He's got to go to the Club to see his cronies and discuss the tactics for the morrow, and smoking and drinking are essentials for the older man's training programme.

Suddenly, it's Saturday. "Is my kit ready? Have you put in my garters; Have you put in my tape? Have you - ?

The children and I wave him off, wishing him luck and good fortune. Anybody would think he was going to the ends of the earth for ever.

Saturday p.m. Enter the walking wounded, I daren't ask if he had won. Best say nothing until Match of the Day has finished ! He’ll pour out his troubles eventually. Will he ever grow up? I look forward to the day of his retirement and when Saturday, Bloody Saturday will rejoin the other days of the week.

Anon, (for the sake of peace at home).