Paul Lewis: Foul act deserves getting a gobful

Charles Barkley was suspended and fined US$10,000 for attempting to spit on a heckling fan hurling racial slurs at him. Photo / Getty Images

Warriors under-20s player James Bell, recently banned for three games after being found guilty of spitting blood at an opponent, unwittingly hit on a broader issue that puzzles many on the sidelines - why do players spit on the field?

Bell's ban suggests the NRL judiciary didn't totally buy his contention that it was accidental, although there is the unspoken mitigation he might not have known he had blood in his mouth at the time. Plenty of players cop a bang in the mouth that produces a bit of claret, which usually clears reasonably quickly. You can't always judge it by taste, as running at pace around a rugby, league or football field often produces a thick taste in the mouth anyway.

So why do players spit? Over a long rugby career, I can remember producing a few mouth missiles but I wasn't a big spitter.

If you believe the biological explanation, exertion like that in all football codes can produce some nasty build-up in the mouth which either has to be swallowed or expelled. But if that was the only explanation, why don't tennis players, basketballers, female hockey players, netballers and those playing many other sports which require a large degree of physical exertion also spit? You don't see Roger Federer producing oysters at Wimbledon, do you? Nor Irene van Dyk on the netball court. So it isn't just expulsion by expectoration, then.

I wore a mouthguard playing rugby. That can dry the mouth appallingly, particularly in warm weather. Rinsing and spitting is one (temporary) solution but doesn't last very long. I rubbed petroleum jelly on my mouthguard - probably not very health-giving in its properties but it didn't taste bad and kept the mouth lubricated, requiring only the occasional jettisoning of excess fluid.

But let's be honest. That's not it, either.

Spitting on the field is a habit, a nervous habit. It's something to do to relieve the tension, like some young women do with cigarettes in social situations. They need something to do with the hands. Like spitting, it's all about striking a pose, looking at home when the reality may be different. It's a bit of a badge and then becomes a habit.

It can also grow into a weapon. Bell's transgression may or may not have been aimed at his opponent. It's impossible to tell in my opinion, although most spitters generally aim down at their feet rather than closer to the horizontal.

There have been some who definitely spat the dummy, like Romanian tennis player Victor Hanescu who, at Wimbledon in 2010, got so bothered at heckling from spectators over the quality of his serving that he spat in their direction. Result: a $10,000 fine.

There was also the infamous Charles Barkley episode on a New Jersey basketball court in 1991, when he attempted to spit on a heckling fan hurling racial slurs at him. Unfortunately, Barkley missed and hit a nine-year-old girl sitting nearby.

Barkley was suspended and fined US$10,000 and reviled by NBA fans and media. Later, in retirement, Barkley said it was his only regret in a controversial career, even though he apologised, later becoming friends with the girl and her family.

"It taught me a valuable lesson," he was quoted as saying. "I was getting way too intense during the game. It let me know I wanted to win way too bad. I had to calm down."

Most spectators, particularly women, find spitting disgusting and can't get past thinking about players rolling in all that spit. It's a hard argument to counter, although I can remember playing in a rugby 10s tournament in Thailand in the wet -- where melioidosis, a nasty soil-borne disease, is common. I was far more concerned about the melioidosis than I ever was about spittle.

As English author and playwright John Mortimer once wrote in Voyage Round My Father, his homage to his blind father, when the old man was being buzzed by a wasp at a picnic: "Ah, when you are being harrassed by a wasp, how you long for a fly...".