Best Canon lens for fast action

I too am yearning for "great/crisp shots in their last year's playing sports in HS. I've been dabbling the last couple months with a P/S Pro1 28 x 200mm f2.4-3.5L. I have a Rebel XT body being delivered to assist me for those soccer and football day/night games. I too am in the limited budget camp but understand "you get what you pay for" and do want great photo's. That being said and after reading this thread, I believe the Canon 200mm f2.8L is "the one" correct? or maybe a sigma 70-200 something or other?

there is no correct lens, but for nighttime sports shots, f2.8 or faster is a must. not only can you pump up the shutter speed while on high ISO, but your focusing gets better, especially on the XT since it's got some bad focusing to begin with . best nighttime sports lens would be the 200mm 1.8, but not everyone has 4k for a used lens... from experience, 200mm will be your main focal length in most outdoor sports, since few people have longer lenses

indoors, 85 1.8 will save your hind when reletively close, and 200mm or 300mm from the other side of the court

basroil wrote in post #2243551
there is no correct lens, but for nighttime sports shots, f2.8 or faster is a must. not only can you pump up the shutter speed while on high ISO, but your focusing gets better, especially on the XT since it's got some bad focusing to begin with . best nighttime sports lens would be the 200mm 1.8, but not everyone has 4k for a used lens... from experience, 200mm will be your main focal length in most outdoor sports, since few people have longer lenses

indoors, 85 1.8 will save your hind when reletively close, and 200mm or 300mm from the other side of the court

Yep, the 200mm 1.8 is one hell of a lens for nighttime sports. I would also consider the 135L if you can deal with the focal length, 85 1.8, and any of the other f2.8 telephoto primes as well as the 70-200 f2.8L.