WE ARE all human. We make mistakes. Some we can look back on and laugh at. Some we can't. We feel regret and sorrow.

Football is an emotional game. It can take you to the highest of highs and it can leave you as flat as a tack, whether a player, coach or fan.

Today, the AFL is more business than pleasure. The stakes are high. There's lots of money and exposure. Sydney's Barry Hall is struggling to control his emotions and actions on the football field. The AFL suspends him, and so does his club. Psychologists and counsellors are called in. Not just at Sydney but at all clubs — because all clubs and businesses have their problems. Stresses and pressures build. People need help and fortunately there is more professional support than ever before.

The focus on Hall this week gave me a chance to recollect some bizarre moments a life in football has provided.

One footballer was too frightened to play against a particular team because it boasted several toughies. For five years leading up to games against the toughies, this player would invariably strain a hamstring, be unavailable for selection and then miraculously make a full recovery the next week.

Then there was the premiership player who had a weight problem. He would fast for a few days leading up to the Thursday-night weigh-in and then spend the next day and a half pigging out on potato chips and cola before playing on the Saturday afternoon.

And then there was the premiership hero who had many times been a star in September. As he got older he feared that he might lose his reputation as a "big game" player, so he repeatedly pulled out of finals games as his career closed.

As the career dimmed on one of the game's very best, he found it hard to come to terms with the fact he was no longer a star player and was being asked to play less significant roles. It came to a head in a nail-biting finish when the defender just left his opponent and went kick chasing in the final few minutes of the game. It was scary to see his opponent unmanned in the forward line.

The rationale put forward by the fading star was that he wanted/needed to be a matchwinner in order to be respected within the ranks. Sadly, he felt that if he wasn't the star, he wasn't worth much at all.

The indigenous player shook me when he responded to my reasons for him being dropped from the team. "You white c---- never give me a go" was his response. It was sad and disappointing because it was way off the mark.

What was frightening was the death threats that two members of my match committee received when a player was delisted. They were from the player himself. One would be shot, the other run over.

For a while there, when we sat in some open-air coaching boxes, as we did in the '80s, I asked this pair that they sit well away from me.

At one club I coached, I had a chairman of selectors who would erupt when the pressure built. He knew his limitations and when he was ready to explode he would get up and walk out of the coach's box, while the game was in progress. He'd sheepishly return 15 minutes later when he had cooled down.

The phone calls came at two or three o'clock in the morning. At that hour they give a hell of a fright. She was the girlfriend of one of my players. The player was estranged from his wife and children. He had moved to another team in another state and the new girlfriend came along for the ride.

When the player's form fell away and he was dropped from the team, the dollars and the gravy train started to slow down. There were fewer gifts, clothes and dinners to be had and she felt it was all the fault of the coach.

When the third early-morning phone call arrived, the "princess" copped more than she bargained for. I never heard from her again.

Another player's partner punted away his football earnings. It was a sad cycle. He loved her, she loved the punt, he needed to play well to keep the dollars rolling in to fund their existence.

What happens in an AFL club is not that different to any other business that employs 80 individuals. People have problems. In business, though, people can take holidays or sick leave when problems arise. In football, that hasn't always been the case.

Rarely would a player ask for time off in July. The expectation was to tough it out. But times are a changing. Barry Hall has been suspended by his club as it tries to help him sort out his on-field anger problems.

And the Western Bulldogs have given time off to their young star, Ryan Griffen, to spend time with his father, who is gravely ill. I'm not so sure that these commonsense decisions would have been taken 10 years ago.