If there is a victory in Nathaniel Price’s new play, it takes place in extra time. The 45-minute first half ends in a goalless draw and it looks like we will reach the 90-minute mark in much the same way. We know who deserves to win. It is Clayton James, a footballer whose single-minded devotion to the beautiful game has taken him to the brink of being signed. Played by Raphael Akuwudike, he has the charm of a young man whose aim is true – off the pitch as much as on.
But he has a tough adversary. We all know what Coach Lafferty is up to, but he is a master of concealment. The way Arthur Wilson plays him, you would think he was everyone’s best friend. Only occasionally does he reveal his menacing core, the controlling instinct beneath the personable exterior. He is a serial abuser, hiding in plain sight.
The playwright himself was once signed to a major-league academy, happily without incident, although recent scandals have highlighted the risks. The strength of his play, set in the late 1970s, is in its observation of the innocuous pace at which grooming happens – a compliment here, a promise there, now a veiled threat, now an ambiguous gesture.
Lafferty is a predator but his behaviour comes across as selfless commitment.
For his part, Clayton is too shellshocked to retaliate. If he is humiliated, embarrassed or furious, he lacks the language to say so. Akuwudike is touching in his helplessness. The best he can do is protect his kid brother, Courtney (an impressive Isaac McLeod at this performance).
Price is less certain finding drama in the period setting. Clayton’s steelworker father, Patterson (Nicholas Bailey), is contemplating crossing a picket line, but his arguments with the boy’s mother, Freya (Claire Goose), about Thatcherite politics are inert. Apart from the observations about the era’s casual racism and homophobia, they have no bearing on the central story.
The director, Jeff James, compensates with a flamboyant production. On Charlotte Espiner’s superb set, half terrace, half front room, he turns training exercises into disco routines and sends footballs cascading over the stage. The theatrical vigour is in sad contrast to the play’s sorry story.
• This article was amended on 14 May 2022. It was Isaac McLeod playing Courtney in this performance, not Taiden Fairall as an earlier version said.
At Nottingham Playhouse until 21 May.
