Glory Of The Football Manager System

On the hour I turned round to the bench.

”James.”

The away corner saw him stand up and started before the board was lit.

”JAMES. JAMES. JAMES.”

Every other stand whistled him, long and high, all the way to the line. He walked through it with his hands on his hips.

”30,” I said.

”I know.” He was looking at Matić. ”I will not need all of it.”

[JAMES RODRÍGUEZ. CONDITION 78%.]

3 minutes later Rodríguez drifted into the space behind Matić, and Matić went with him. 6 yards.

Eze rolled it square. Rúben Neves was on the edge of the D with the ball under his foot and nobody within 12 yards of him.

He did not look up.

Thump.

It went straight at De Gea, flat and hard, and then late it bent away, and De Gea got his left hand to it at full stretch and it took the hand with it into the top corner.

2-1.

The front rows went quiet first. Then the rows behind them. Then the tiers above. At the back of the Stretford End they were still singing with the ball already in the net, and then they stopped too.

In the corner, Glad All Over, into a silent ground.

Neves ran past his own bench and stood in front of my box with his arms out and his chest heaving.

”NOBODY!”

”27 minutes,” I said. ”Go and be that for 27 minutes.”

Bray was at my shoulder before Neves had got back to the centre circle.

”Sit them in? 5 at the back?”

”No. Rúben stays. James stays.”

”Danny.”

”They stay, Bray.”

Behind me the South Stand found a new one.

”WALSH, YOU’RE A JUDAS. WALSH, YOU’RE A JUDAS.”

Sánchez came on for Mata. Fellaini came on for Herrera. After that every ball came into our box in the air, and every ball that went up, the ground went up with it, a roar climbing and breaking into a groan every time a Palace head got there first.

Pope came through a crowd of bodies and took 1 off Lukaku’s head with 1 hand, oof, and got flattened for it, and the whole Stretford End screamed for a penalty with their arms out.

Marcus Rashford came on for Martial, and the ground stood for him.

”Chilwell!” Bray was hoarse. ”Inside, Ben. INSIDE.”

Rashford went past Chilwell into our 6 yard box with the goal open, and Aaron Wan-Bissaka slid across and took the ball off his toe, tk, and the noise stopped halfway through itself.

”AARON. AARON. AARON.” From the away corner. Nobody else in the ground made a sound.

With 8 minutes left I sent Ellis Cartwright on for Benteke, and the away corner stood and clapped Benteke all the way to the bench.

”Lindelöf turns slowly to his left,” I told Cartwright at the line.

”His left or mine?”

”His. Run on his left shoulder.”

2 minutes later Sakho went through the back of Sánchez on halfway. The South Stand came up out of its seats roaring for the second yellow. Michael Dean jogged past my box without reaching for his pocket.

”Next one, Danny.”

I put the board up. Sakho saw it and came off at a jog, shook my hand, and sat down next to Joel Ward, and Axel Tuanzebe went on. The Stretford End booed Tuanzebe the second his number went up. The away corner sang his name over the top of it until he put a hand up to them.

In the 88th minute Luke Shaw went up the pitch, and the whole ground was on its feet pushing him.

The ball came off Fellaini’s shin on the edge of our box, to Rodríguez. He took it on his chest with 3 red shirts closing, turned out of all 3 with 1 touch, and went 30 yards into the grass Shaw had left.

The roar went thin all the way round. 1 voice in the East Stand.

”FOUL HIM.”

Nobody did.

Cartwright was running on Lindelöf’s left shoulder.

Rodríguez did not look at him. He slid it with the outside of his left foot into the wet grass 40 yards ahead, and Cartwright ran onto it without breaking stride and put it under De Gea with his left foot.

3-1.

Clack. Clack clack. Clack.

Seats. Thousands of them flipping up on their springs, all round the ground, people standing and turning for the stairs.

On our bench Mamadou Sakho stood up with his coat round his shoulders and watched them go.

”They go home?” he said. ”It is not finished. Why do they go home?”

Cartwright ran straight past the away corner to Rodríguez and grabbed him by the shirt with both hands.

”His left!” He was pointing at me across the pitch. ”His left, gaffer!”

”His left,” Rodríguez said, and pushed the boy’s head down into his shoulder.

[ELLIS CARTWRIGHT. CA 113. PA 148.]

The seat in the front row by the tunnel was empty.

”WE ARE PALACE. WE ARE PALACE. WE ARE PALACE.”

It bounced off the empty seats of the Stretford End and came back to them twice.

In the 92nd minute Neves stepped in front of a Pogba pass and gave it to Rodríguez on the centre circle. Rodríguez did not run. He walked it into their half.

Victor Lindelöf came out of the line for him.

Rodríguez waited until he was a yard away and rolled it through his legs. Zip.

”OLÉ!”

2 more touches into the box. De Gea came off his line. Rodríguez got his left foot under it and lifted it, and it went up slowly in the lights and dropped in behind De Gea’s glove. Swsh.

4-1.

The away corner took the song they had been hearing all afternoon and turned it round.

”HE’S NOT RED ANYMORE. HE’S NOT RED ANYMORE.”

The ones still in the South Stand came down to the rail behind me.

”JUDAS. YOU JUDAS.”

A plastic bottle landed on the paint 2 feet from my shoe, pok, and rolled. Bray put his foot on it. A steward was already coming down the steps with his arm out, and I did not turn round.

PRRRP. PRRRP.

Rodríguez came straight to the line and held up 4 fingers.

”34 minutes,” he said. ”Tell Rebecca sorry for the 4.”

José Mourinho was waiting by the dugout. We shook hands once. He went down the tunnel with his collar up, and what was left of the South Stand booed the pair of us.

I went round to the away corner with the players. They sang Benteke’s name, and Cartwright’s, and Rodríguez’s, and then they sang the Judas song back at the empty stands with PALACE where JUDAS had been.

My mother was in row G of block E134, in a Palace hat she had bought herself, next to her sister Sheila.

”There was a banner about your dad,” she said.

”I saw it.”

”I told a steward. He said there was nothing he could do. I said I know that, love, I just wanted somebody to have heard it.” She held her handbag with both hands. ”And they sang that song at you all afternoon, and you stood in that little box like a man waiting for a bus.”

”I have to, Mum.”

”He would have been down the front, you know. Shouting.”

”At me or at them?”

”At the referee,” she said. ”He never once watched the football.”

On the coach, Sarah sat down across the aisle with rain in her hair.

”Michael Cooke rang at 5 past 5. He is sat outside a house in Hampton with a bag of kit on the back seat.” She put the phone away. ”The boy’s mother finishes work at 7. He wants to know if you are coming, or if he goes in on his own.”