Kevin Lowe wrote:
Spirit isn't about giving your opponents things at crucial times,
it's about calling it EXACTLY as you see it
I disagree with this. Two people standing next to each other on the
sideline, even with no real interest in the game, may 'see' a
situation very differently.
Spirit is accepting that sometimes what you think you saw doesn't
match what people around you think they saw. That happens even when
emotions aren't running high, so to be able to do that at a crucial
time under real pressure does deserve extra credit.
It's true that we don't all see things the same way, which is why we
have to be able to discuss it afterwards. You have to call it exactly as
you see it, and if you find that everyone disagrees, you might have a
rethink. I just really don't like the wording of that definition.
'Giving' an advantage to the opposition implies to me that I was
persuaded to withdraw a call not because I was persuaded it was wrong,
but for some other reason. That's not spirit.
If I'm unsure, I can be persuaded by someone with a better view. That's
part of the subjective nature of the situation. But 'giving' the
opposition something, when I'm sure it was/wasn't a foul, is not to be
applauded.
I think there's a discussion to be had about how we view spirit - the
fact that we offer a prize to the best spirited team is taken by some
people to imply that you can display really great spirit, over and above
that enshrined in the rules. I don't think this is true - the rules
require /perfect/ spirit, and though teams can never achieve that in the
real world, that's what we're aiming for. It's all about trying to live
up to an ideal.
The difference is relevant in that a close game gives you the
opportunity to /show/ good spirit that isn't offered by an easy victory.
If we think 'great' spirit can be shown, then it's easy to see why close
matches can produce higher spirit scores as in this 6-point system. But
if we think a spirit score is a measure of how far we fall short of an
ideal, then the fact that we weren't tested because the game wasn't
tight is irrelevant; if we do nothing wrong we get the highest score.
B
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