I was at a Rugby match this afternoon that was neither hot, nor cold, just colourless and earthbound.

There were flashes of drama, and the occasional touchline tussle where you could almost see the shock waves radiating after a bruising tackle; but for long periods the match lacked any hook. I sat there, watched, and took nothing in.

I prayed for action, even controversy, a questionable decision, anything to make it memorable, so there would be at least something to dissect - and probably dispute in the car on the way home - but really more for a friend's young son. This was his first time at a match.

With the noise of drums and ragged terrace chanting, booming around the ground, and men shouting or whistling, the place was a cauldron.

I wanted him to go home with the foundations of a memory - the time he went with his dad and his dad's friends to a rugby match.

I was hoping he would experience, and never forget, the camaraderie, that following your side into battle fosters. Where you become part of something bigger and sense the mutual complicity that goes with it. Being amidst the hubbub of excited, roaring crowds. And how to work through the all too often heartache of the ball just not bouncing the way you hoped.

Instead, the game delivered flat nothing.

If I'm honest, then I know why I wanted it to be a gotterdammerung of a game, it's this: in remembering the game, he would remember us, his dad's friends as well. We would live on even when we're no longer here.

I had a profound sense of my own mortality throughout the whole game. Unknown adventures and excitements await this young man's generation which none of us will see.