IF I had a pound for every time I was called a great lover I would only have to borrow a quid to buy the naming rights at Ibrox.

In truth, I was once called a monster in bed but it was only because I was wearing my Godzilla pyjamas. My search for approval - in and out of my pit - has been long and fruitless. Like a Greggs all-day breakfast. My work life has been dotted with the odd compliment.

For example, I once asked the sports editor if my column was okay and he replied: "Yeah, there's plenty of it." He also once exulted that most of my words were also in the right order. I was so happy I had to have a jag of moroseness, quickly supplied by gazing at a sub-editor tabulating Romania Liga 1 standings.

Approval in my private life reached a peak when my maw spat in her hankie, rubbed it severely into my face and declared: "You'll just have to do."

So there it is. I find approval with the same ease with which I find a unicorn with a recordable singing voice. The human need for external validation is not just restricted to bald sports writers with a penchant for metaphors so exotic, dumb and lame they should be cared for in a specialist veterinary clinic. No, it includes the very great.

Late last Saturday night I sat in the O2 Arena as Stan Wawrinka, the only tennis player who moonlights dragging Santa's sleigh (check that hooter), broke the serve of Roger Federer. Now, this is a technical term that frankly baffles me too but, then again, I have only been watching tennis for half a century. Suffice to say, Wawrinka had accomplished something.

His reaction was enlightening. He did not punch the air, roar or sing in delight. He merely had a sly look towards his coach Magnus Norman. He was looking for approval and he received it in the shape of the slightest of nods.

Wawrinka, who is as tough as old boots made of teak and left in the freezer, broke into an expression I had last seen when my son proudly showed me the contents of his potty.

I wonder if this is the key to extracting a great performance from a great player. It is obvious there must be talent, dedication, hours of practice and a dod of good fortune. But I have always searched for the true roots of motivation.

What makes Roger run at 33 with four kids and and tens and tens of millions of pounds? What pushes Andy Murray to come back from both surgery and heavy defeat? Why does Rafa Nadal continue to play on despite having had more surgery than a box set of Casualty?

It is not the love of money. It is not even the love of the sport. They are seeking something else.

The validation is highly visible at tennis. It is there at courtside. Wawrinka looks up and sees his coach, Federer looks up and sees his coach, Stefan Edberg, his dad and sometimes even his mum and almost always his wife, Mirka (Her validation of Wawrinka is worth another column).

Andy Murray has a support team, that includes his mother and his dad at big occasions. Rafa peers up in moments of crisis and triumph and sees Uncle Toni, the veritable viceroy of validation. If Toni drove Rafa any harder he would not need surgery but a full service. But all the players top players need that external support.

They are alone on court and they tell themselves they are doing it for themselves. They are but not perhaps in the way they think. They may be doing it for the feeling they receive when they feel they are loved.

Their achievements pile up in stacks of dollars, in titles and in column inches. But Wawrinka's glance, Roger's regular peeks at his entourage, Rafa's stare at Uncle Toni and Murray's climb to the box at Wimbledon shows there is much more to it than material matters.

As Lou Reed put it in Coney Island Baby, that paeon to sporting mores formed in his five-a-side career with Velvet Underground, they want to play for the coach. Or the mum, dad or missus.

They do it to be loved. If they want a real challenge, though, they should try to impress a sports editor.