I really don’t like football, have no desire to discuss it, no interest in it whatsoever. There’s no need. There’s things like cricket; we just beat the (once the absolute mightiest) West Indies by an innings and 200 odd runs in the first test. Took 3 days (note to non-cricket fans: that’s a virtual blink of an eye in that game; like winning a tennis match in 22 minutes). And there’s rugby.

Rugby? But there’s no test matches being played and the season hasn’t started yet??? I hear you ponder… ish.

Ahhh but this isn’t about the game, per se, more about one player. One of our own. Toby Flood. Superstar fly-half who has played 60 times for England. Blond feller. Played for Toulouse for 3 years and now… he’s going to play in Germany. Germany? They don’t play rugby, surely? They cheat at football with that penalties thing, they drink beer, do strange things, but rugby?

They are not traditionally a ‘rugby playing nation’, that’s true. But no nation is until they start playing it. Then, by some kind of definition, they must be. And they beat Uruguay in the last world cup so they can’t be that bad. And they want to get better. They want to field a team in the next Olympics, which will probably be run by a pharmaceutical company to save time and effort.

And Toby is part-German. Had a German grandfather. An actor in Berlin called Anthony Lieven. But he fled Berlin in 1936 because, like all Jews, he was about to become persecuted like no people have ever been persecuted, before or since. He came to England, in fact. Where he was watched by the government for being a ‘possible communist’. Virtually every German Jew in 1936 was a ‘possible communist’ due to their desire to get as much distance from Naziism as they could.

And that’s why it makes me happy. Toby Flood is (in some way, some small part, some degree) a Jew. An international rugby-playing Jew. And as Jews, so well represented in business, in the arts, in scholarly pursuits, in general bookishness and cleverness, are tragically under-represented in major sports, its wonderful to find a new one. Even though (the grandfather’s son had a half-sister who is Toby’s mum) the link from outside half to barmitzvah boy may be tenuous, I don’t care. I’ll take one Jewish toe-nail. We can adopt him.

So to claim his German-ness, Toby has to play domestic German rugby for 3 years, which, at the end of his glowing career, he’s happy to do. For his ‘other’ country.

Next week: rabbis playing the Eton Wall Game.

Happy Monday

A xxxx