Naked Hero - The Journey Away

returned to the court, shouts of “Go Aussie Go!” broke out from a group to his right, situated directly behind the umpire’s chair. Rather odd as the players involved were both Spaniards. Neither of them seemed particularly concerned with the chanting, however, and they spent the next half hour grinding out the remainder of their match to a conclusion.
    As the players left the court, a few in the crowd decided to leave also - Hispanics who had actually turned up to watch their countrymen play rather than book a place for the main event of the day. As Scott looked around, he noticed Jim Murdoch sitting in the opposite stand, scribbling frantically in his notebook, logging observations and thoughts no doubt, in preparation for the next round, where hopefully Lewis would meet the winner of the match that had just been played. Scott had checked out the draw - he knew what Jim was about.
    There was a temptation to go over to say hello to the coach. Scott had taken a liking to the old boy and his gruff manner, and admired him for what he had done. But he decided against it. Jim would undoubtedly quiz him on his decision, and Scott wasn’t quite ready yet to give an answer. Lewis Macleod needed to win this match first to make it relevant, and that wasn’t a foregone conclusion. And Scott Taylor needed to witness what happened - he needed to see for himself what the decision might entail.
    Five minutes later, the next pair of players arrived. It was barely credible that anything could be heard above the buzz around the court before they got there, but the poor sods who stood sweltering outside queuing, but with no chance of gaining admittance, managed to make themselves heard. It was a mixture of cheers and wolf whistles, with the odd expletive thrown in for good measure that carried itself over the boundary, and in true Mexican wave fashion soon rippled around stands as the two men who would contest the next match on Court Five were escorted into the ground.
    “Go Aussie Go!” rang out again and elicited a smile from one of the players, the more outwardly nervous of the two. He probably would have relaxed a bit - comforted by the support if that was all they had to offer, but sadly those nerves were compounded by some of the other shouts he heard. Shouts that might not have been directed at him, but were unsettling nonetheless. This wasn’t the scene he had envisaged for the biggest match of his young life - but it promised to be a memorable day!
    The real target of the abuse took no notice. House music was blasting out of his iPod and into his ears, blocking out everything else around: a cocoon of electronic wizardry - a sound to mask the sound. It belonged to another world. But then so perhaps did Lewis Macleod. It was a thought on many peoples’ mind.
    Once seated, a quick glance around the stands was all that Lewis allowed himself. He checked out where Jim was then he blanked it all out. Expressionless, he stared straight ahead, and tried to look inwards to a happier place. Impervious, he went through the mantra which Guru Murdoch had drummed into his head. ‘ It’s just you and him - no one else. The ball, the net, the lines - that’s all you need to see. The sound of the ball on your racket - that’s all you need to hear.’
    As Lewis repeated this nonsense, the volume of the music was gradually reduced, so that by the time the umpire called them for the toss, the music had been replaced by the noise of the crowd - a noise which Lewis could hear but somehow didn’t register. It was being funnelled away to some recess in his brain - an imprint that could fester for as long as he cared.
    It was his opponent who seemed the more affected by the party atmosphere as the match began, and Lewis was quickly up a break. Serves were thundered and returns were cracked back, ground strokes were walloped and volleys biff bashed. Lewis Macleod was well in command and ran away with the first set. Twenty minutes was all that it took. He was having a bit of a stroll.
    ‘Rent a Mob’ behind his chair weren’t too happy about things, though. They were well pissed off by the ‘faggot’s’ display. This certainly wasn’t what they were looking for. They had been given a script and that woofter, Macleod, was getting his lines all wrong. Act two had best be better, or they might as well go home.
    It didn’t bode well for them in the opening scenes. ‘Thunder, crack, wallop, biff bash.’ Macleod was all over their