The David Brooks news has made me reflect a little. First and foremost, get well soon to the young man. Above all, that matters the most.
Then I think back to how we’ve discussed him of late. Let’s be honest, his form hasn’t been great. There were occasional flashes of the quality we know he possesses but nowhere near the level on a consistent basis we know he’s capable of reaching. You could easily argue that a fully fit and in form David Brooks would be the best player in the Championship and yet he’s struggled to get a starting berth with us since Christie joined.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. It allows you to join dots and say ‘Well, of course. That’s the reason for that’. I know the sum of diddly squat about his illness but, from my position of pure ignorance, I’m sure that this has been sapping his body and strength for some time.
Footballers are top athletes and if something knocks their equilibrium out, it can have an effect across the board. If they aren’t as confident in their body, they aren’t as confident in their play. Not as confident in their play? Those silky skills suddenly look a little wooden and don’t come off in the same way. It can be a spiral that’s hard to break, especially if you don’t know the reason that caused it in the first place.
There’s a huge danger here that I’m retrofitting this illness to his form but as fans, we often make sweeping connections. We also make judgements and see some things as acceptable and others not based on the limited information we have; what happens on the pitch, rumours and (mostly) sanitised interviews.
Mental health is a topic that has changed a lot in recent years, for the good. People are now much more accepting of the debilitating effect it can have and (ignoring the outlier posters on here) recognise it can impact anyone. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got a cool job and lots of money, you can still suffer from depression.
Which brings me to he who shall not be named. Well usually, but this time I shall do so: Ryan Fraser. There’s a conflict here. The guy has said publicly he has struggled with his mental health yet, as fans, we’ve dismissed that on the back of everything else. Is he any less deserving of sympathy because his struggle isn’t a physical one? We don't know 100% he was suffering in his last season here but it isn't beyond the realms of possibility.
I’ve been wrestling with this since yesterday’s news. How much of his behaviour could be attributed to a mental health issue and how much to him simply behaving in a pretty awful way? Anyone who has been around someone with a mental health problem will likely have seen some behaviours which are out of character and could be classified as unpleasant but, because you know the person, you know it’s the illness and not them.
I want to be the adult about it and think maybe who he was in his final season here wasn’t who he is as a person and therefore I shouldn’t judge him for it. Yet, as a fan, I still squarely pin the relegation on him downing tools throughout the whole season when an injury crisis meant we had to pick him. Forget the bit about not extending his contract, it was the half-hearted not trying during the rest of the matches that bothered me the most.
Which leads me to recognise that a fan is not a rational adult. We can’t accept failures of players the way we may other people. Stop the press! That must be the least insightful comment you’re likely to read this year.
Still, Brooks and Fraser are two extremes in many ways.
What about Josh King? A guy with a range of suprising injuries and illnesses causing him to miss games and then, shall we say, mostly below par performances when he was picked all of which happened to coincide with a time he wanted away.
He’s been judged and found guilty in the court of fan opinion. At least by most, although to be fair there are a few defenders of him out there. Yet, we can’t really know what happened behind the scenes. Forget the Man Utd move and the alleged promise. Forget the headache and so on. Could the much-mocked ‘worst six months of my life’ quote have been an indicator of something else that was impacting him?
Have we been unfair to him on a human level by damning him on a fan level? Probably not, but we can't be sure.
Then there’s Callum Wilson. No need to pull punches, during his last season with us he was a shadow of the player he’d been previously. He also jumped ship as soon as he could after relegation to Newcastle and there wasn’t a hint of some larger issue affecting him. There’s been criticism but not nearly the same level of condemnation that Fraser received.
Because Wilson dealt with the media better when, as far as we know, not suffering from a mental health issue compared to Fraser who made misjudged comments when he could well have been, Callum got off lightly. Is that fair?
Yet, in the light of all this thought, do I still damn Fraser in my head? Hell, yes. It’s an emotional response even if it (maybe) isn’t a fair one. At least I question myself a touch though.
I’m absolutely guilty of rants against players on here. I’m not trying to excuse that and it likely won’t change. I guess all I can take from all this swirl of thoughts is what should seem obvious but sometimes we forget:
- Players are humans too (I). We should try to treat them like that.
- Players are humans too (II). Humans fcuk up in outrageous ways sometimes. They’re human.
- Form is a fickle mistress. So many things can affect a players form, many of which we don’t know, and may never know, anything about.
- Mental illness can be as debilitating to a players ability to perform as a physical one.
Does that mean I’ll give players an easy ride? Not really. Remember that I said fans aren’t rational? I do hope I’ll try and pick my words carefully though. Comment on the performance, not the person.
