US UNIVERSITY COACHES BANNED FROM
USING TEXT MESSAGE TO RECRUIT

Recruitment of new players for their college programmes plays a major part of a golf coach's life in the United States. Their hands are tied in more ways than you might think. There is a strict list of what they can do and what they cannot do to get the best players to sign Letters of Intent to join this or that university.
The NCAA board of directors have added one more restriction, which reflects the way communication between individuals has changed in recent times.
The ruling body of American college sport has imposed a ban this week on ALL text messages from coaches to potential recruits. It will come into effect in August.
E-mails and faxes and letters - remember them? - would still be permissible and subject to current NCAA guidelines, which include some time periods that prohibit coaches from contacting recruits in any form.
"The board was swayed very much by what the student-athletes themselves had to say,'' said an NCAA official. "We heard anecdotal stories of someone waking up and having 52 text messages.''
It is recognised that enforcing the new measure could prove difficult.
"You're not allowed to buy a kid a hamburger when he goes on the road, but that's tough to enforce, too. There are many rules that, on the face of them, are unenforceable,'' said the official.