Glory Of The Football Manager System

Three at the break. The away end at Wembley went silent in the way the away end at Wembley goes silent when the away end has been told the away end is going home in a hundred-something minutes.

I did not say much in the dressing room.

Same shape. Same plan. Mateo and Rúben do not stop carrying. Eze finds the channel. Michael and Wilf find the second touch. Christopher off at sixty-five for Pato. Aviero for Eze at seventy-five. McArthur for Mateo at eighty if we are still in control.

Mateo drank his water in three swallows.

Rúben sat on the bench with his eyes closed for the four minutes between the talk and the bell.

Christopher Benteke patted Mateo on the shoulder on the way out. Mateo did not look up. Did not need to.

The bell went.

We went back out.

[56’.]

The fourth came from a counter.

Pellè had been on the ball at the edge of our box and lost it to Mama with a slide tackle that should have been on a poster. Mama played Rúben. Rúben played Eze. Eze took one touch and turned. Two players in front of him. Three players behind him. He played the no-look ball with the outside of his right foot to Olise who had not stopped running since the third goal.

Olise to Wilf with a square ball that Wilf did not need to break stride for.

Wilf put it in the bottom corner from twelve yards.

The Palace end stood for him for ninety seconds.

Wilf went to the corner. Mama caught him. Eze caught Mama. The pile got bigger. Konaté joined it.

Mateo was at the halfway line bent at the waist with his hands on his thighs. I thought it was breath.

It was not breath.

[Crystal Palace 4 - Southampton 0.]

[64’.]

Mateo was on the ball at the halfway line.

He took it off McArthur no, off Højbjerg, who had pushed up too far on a press. Mateo did the thing. The drop of the shoulder. The first touch with the outside of the right.

He pushed it five yards into the channel.

He went after it.

The leg gave under him on the second stride.

He did not fall straight away. He went two more steps. Then the second leg gave. Then he went down. He did not roll. He sat. He did not put his hands up to the referee for medical attention. He put both his hands flat on the grass behind him and stared at the back of his right thigh.

The Wembley crowd went quiet in two waves. The Palace end first because they could see it. The Southampton end second because the Southampton end could see that the Palace end had gone quiet.

I was at the touchline before I knew I had moved.

The fourth official was at my shoulder. I did not see him.

”Daniel.”

”Get the doctor on.”

Rebecca was already on. She had been on the bench for ninety-six matches this season and she had not been on the pitch for ninety-three of them. She got to Mateo at the halfway line in twelve seconds. She did not kneel. She squatted next to him. Said something I could not hear. Mateo nodded once.

She turned and looked at the bench.

She raised her hand.

The stretcher came on from the tunnel before Rebecca had finished raising her hand.

The Palace end started to clap. Slowly at first. Then more of them. Then the whole forty-three thousand of them. Then the Southampton end started clapping. Then the whole of Wembley was clapping for Mateo Kovačić, twenty-four-year-old central midfielder, who had carried a Premier League side for ten months and who was not going to carry them for the rest of this season.

He sat on the stretcher.

He did not lie down on it because Mateo would not lie down on a stretcher in front of seventy thousand people.

They wheeled him off.

He came past me on the touchline. He did not look at me at first. Then he did. He had one hand still on the back of his right thigh. The other one came up and grabbed my forearm at the elbow.

”Daniel.”

”Yeah.”

”Lisbon.”

”Mateo.”

”Lisbon. Tell the lads they go to Lisbon and they go to Lisbon for me. And they go to Lyon for me. And they beat City for me. Tell the lads.”

”I’ll tell them.”

”Tell them.”

The stretcher went down the tunnel. Rebecca was next to it. I watched it until it was gone. McArthur was warming up at the side of the pitch and had been warming up since the moment Mateo had gone down. Sarah was at my shoulder. She did not say anything.

She put her hand flat on the small of my back for two seconds. Then took it off.

The fourth official held up the board.

KOVAČIČ off. MCARTHUR on.

[78’.]

The match continued because the match had to continue.

Aviero on for Eze at seventy. Pato on for Christopher at seventy-two. The Palace end sang Mateo’s name from the seventy-fifth to the seventy-eighth.

In the seventy-eighth minute, off a counter that Aviero had started, Pato finished off the bench the way Pato had finished off the bench against Sporting on Thursday night. Through ball from Wilf. Pato took it round the keeper. Tap-in.

Five-nil.

Pato turned and pointed at the tunnel that Mateo had been carried down. Then he turned and ran to Aviero. The pile got bigger.

[Crystal Palace 5 - Southampton 0.]

The match ended at six-eleven.

BLEEP. BLEEP. BLEEP.

The Palace end sang. The Southampton end emptied at ninety plus one. The lads went to the Palace end. They went without me because I had to go down the tunnel.

[Wembley. The Tunnel. 18:19 BST.]

Rebecca was at the door of the medical room.

”Hamstring.”

”How bad.”

”Grade two. Maybe grade three. We will have an MRI at the Cromwell Hospital at ten tomorrow morning. He is on his way there now in the club car.”

”What’s the range.”

”Grade two is four to six weeks. Grade three is eight to twelve. We will know tomorrow.”

”Sporting on Thursday.”

”He does not play Sporting on Thursday.”

”Lyon.”

”Daniel.”

”He does not play Lyon.”

”I cannot tell you that yet. If it is a low grade two and he heals quickly and we manage the rehab properly, he might be available for the bench at Lyon. He will not be in the starting eleven.”

”All right.”

”He was already in the car park when I came out. He sent me to tell you he is sorry.”

”Tell him I am sorry.”

”Daniel. He pulled it himself. He was on a flat run on a Wembley pitch. The flat pitch did not pull his hamstring. Mateo’s hamstring pulled itself. He has played eighty-three matches in eight months across two clubs. The hamstring was overdue. He is going to tell himself it is his fault and you are going to tell him it is not.”

”I will tell him it is not.”

She nodded. Went back into the medical room.

I stood in the corridor for a minute. Then went to the dressing room.

[Wembley. The Dressing Room. 18:34 BST.]

The room was loud when I came in. Loud the way a dressing room is loud after a five-nil semi-final win at Wembley. Mama on the table singing something in French. Konaté pouring water over Olise’s head. Wilf and Pato laughing at the back wall. Christopher in the corner with the lads who had not played.

It went quiet when they saw my face.

”Mateo.”

The room held its breath.

”Hamstring. Grade two. Probably four to six weeks if he heals on time. He is at the Cromwell for an MRI in the morning. He told me to tell you to go to Lisbon for him and to go to Lyon for him and to beat City for him. That is what I am telling you.”

Mama got off the table.

Konaté put the water bottle down.

Wilf and Pato came across from the back wall.

The lads got to me. Konaté put one hand on the back of my neck. Mama put one hand on my shoulder. Wilf came in to the front.

”Gaffer.”

”Yeah.”

”We will go to Lisbon for him. We will go to Lyon for him. We will beat City for him. You tell him that on the phone tonight. From all of us. Word for word.”

”All right.”

”Word for word, Gaffer.”

”Word for word.”

The room came back up to volume. Mama got back on the table. Konaté did not pour any more water over Olise. The volume was different now. The volume was a Wembley dressing room volume that knew about the cost.

I let them have it.

[Wembley. The Corridor. 19:48 BST.]

I came out of the dressing room at quarter to eight because I had to do the press.

Sarah was at the door waiting.

”Pellegrino is already done. Sky want you for nine minutes. BBC for six. Match of the Day want a thirty-second sit-down for half ten. Garth Crooks has been at the BBC tunnel for twenty minutes and is not in a hurry.”

”All right.”

”Steve Parish is in the directors’ lounge. He says he needs five minutes before you go to the press. He says it cannot wait.”

”What is it.”

”He did not tell me. He said five minutes. I do not think he is going to take five.”

I went to the directors’ lounge.

***

Thank you to Sir nameyelus for the support.