Glory Of The Football Manager System

”He goes in on his own,” I said.

Sarah had the phone halfway back to her ear.

”Boss, he asked...”

”I know what he asked. It is his note on that file, and it is his car outside that house.” I held my hand out, palm up, and she put the phone in it. ”Michael.”

The line was full of heavy rain beating on a windscreen.

”Boss.”

”You go in on your own. When you are sat down in their kitchen, ring me and put me on the table. I will say one thing and then I will be quiet.”

”What is the one thing?”

”You will hear it when she does.”

He did not say anything for a long time. The sound of a car went past him with its wipers dragging across the glass.

”Right,” Michael Cooke said, and the line went dead.

Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt.

That was Nathan’s phone across the aisle, and it did not stop. He had it face down on his thigh and the vibration was spinning it in a slow, angry circle against the fabric of his club tracksuit.

”Boss.”

”What?”

He turned it over and held it out across the aisle.

It was a photograph pulled off the Sky television feed, taken from low down by the Old Trafford corner flag. James Rodríguez stood on the touchline in the Manchester rain with four fingers held up, looking directly into the lens. Behind him, out of focus but unmistakable, the Stretford End was on its feet, furious and emptying.

”That has gone,” Nathan said, his voice flat. ”It went at five past five. It is everywhere.”

”He was telling me he did thirty-four minutes.”

”I know that. You know that.” Nathan scrolled down with his thumb. ”Three fingers in their own press room in August from Mourinho. Four fingers in front of the Stretford End in October from your marquee sub. That is the back page of every paper in the country tomorrow, boss, and I did not write it.”

From four rows back, a voice cut through the hum of the engine.

”What is everywhere?”

Nathan held the glowing phone up over the seat. James Rodríguez leaned forward and looked at it for a long time.

”This is Rebecca’s minutes.”

”They think it is the goals, James,” Hakimi said from across the aisle.

”It was four goals,” Wilfried Zaha pointed out, not looking up from his iPad.

”No.” Rodríguez was up on his knees on the seat now, holding Nathan’s phone, genuinely frustrated. ”No, no. This is thirty and four. This is me saying sorry to Rebecca.”

”Nobody in the world is going to believe that, James.”

Rebecca was two rows in front with her medical card resting on her knee. She did not turn round.

”I believe it,” she said to the window. ”It was four minutes over and I have written them down in red.”

The whole back of the coach went up. Benteke had to hold on to the headrest to stop laughing. Rodríguez sat back down with Nathan’s phone in both hands, staring at his own face.

”It is a very good photograph,” he said, quieter now.

Bzzt.

At ten past eight, somewhere past Stoke in the pitch black of the M6, my own phone vibrated. I put it on the table in front of me and pressed the speaker button.

The background noise of a house. A kettle, close to the receiver. A television in another room with the volume turned down low. A dog somewhere scratching at a door.

”You are on the table, boss,” Michael Cooke said.

”Go on then.”

”Mrs Asare, this is Danny Walsh. He is on the coach home from Manchester.”

”I know who he is.” A woman’s voice, further away from the phone. It was a voice tired from a long shift, not in the mood for football men in suits. ”Dion. Turn that off.”

The television clicked off. The kettle clicked off.

”I wrote on your file, Dion,” Michael Cooke said, and I could hear the tightness in his throat, ”that you were not physically ready for men’s football. I wrote it in May 2017, in an office at Beckenham, and I was right in May. And then you went to Hampton and you got ready on your own, and I did not come and look. Not once. Nobody from our football club came and looked.”

Nobody in that kitchen said a word.

”That is my fault. I have come to say it in your kitchen because your mum should hear me say it.”

”He sat in that car park for an hour,” the woman said, her voice sharp now. ”After you let him go. He would not come out of the car. He just stared at the dashboard.”

”I know.”

”You do not know. You were in your office.” A ceramic mug went down on a worktop, hard. ”Go on, then. Say whatever the other one is going to say.”

That was me. I leaned forward over the table.

”I want Dion at Beckenham on Tuesday,” I said. ”Under 23s, Tuesday and Thursday, for two weeks. He plays for Hampton on the Saturday, because he is their centre forward and they need him. Nobody signs anything. At the end of the two weeks, Michael comes back to this kitchen and tells him what he saw, to his face, with you sat there at that table.”

”And if he says not ready again?”

”Then he says it here,” I said, ”and he says exactly what Dion has to do to change it, and he comes back in a month and looks again.”

A chair scraped violently against lino.

”I have got work Tuesday.” A young man’s voice. Lower and thicker than I expected. ”Warehouse. Tuesday and Thursday are my shifts.”

”You will swap them,” his mother said instantly.

”Mum.”

”You will swap them, Dion.”

The dog had stopped at the door. Somebody let it in, and it went straight to the table, claws clicking on the floor.

”Tuesday,” Dion Asare said. ”What time?”

”Half eight,” Michael Cooke said. ”I will pick you up at seven.”

”I can get the train.”

”I know you can get the train,” Cooke said. ”I will pick you up at seven.”

I took the phone off speaker before anybody could thank anybody, and put it in my coat pocket. Sarah had been watching me across the aisle the whole time with her hands wrapped round a coffee she had not drunk.

”Issott is going to absolutely love this,” she said.

”Issott knew on the 17th.”

”And the papers?”

”The papers are busy,” I said, and pointed at Nathan’s phone, still spinning in its slow, agonizing circle on his knee.

Bzzt. Bzzt.

Somewhere near Birmingham, Nathan gave up turning it face down. I do not have an account on any of it. He started reading them to me anyway, the blue light reflecting in his glasses.

”Moss Side rat. That is the most common one. There is a hashtag. JudasWalsh. It has been top trending in the country since half past six.”

”Go on.”

”Your dad stood on the Stretford End for thirty years and you spat on it. That has eleven thousand likes.” He scrolled with his thumb. ”Hope your coach crashes on the M6. I have reported that one. Walsh the snake, he did not even have the bottle to answer the letter. Somebody has put your face on a painting of the Last Supper, on the end, holding a bag of money.”

”Which painting?”

”Does it matter, boss?”

Wilfried Zaha had come forward to the seat behind Nathan and was reading over his shoulder in the dark.

”That is quite a good photoshop, actually,” Zaha said.

”Wilf.”

”I am only saying. Somebody took their time on the lighting.”

”There is a video of the lads outside the museum singing the Judas song at the coach,” Nathan went on, ignoring him, ”and a lad in a United shirt holding up a picture of you at fourteen in a Manchester United kit. From somewhere, I do not know where. With a thick red marker line drawn through your face.”

I had not seen that photograph in fifteen years. It was pinned to my mother’s fridge in Moss Side, the last time I looked at it.

”Where did they get that?”

”I do not know.” Nathan looked up, his expression grim. ”I will find out.”

He kept reading. Most of it was the same five words rearranged into different threats. Some of them were things he would not read out loud and did not need to, and he sent every single one of those to the club’s solicitor directly from the coach with the timestamp attached.

At eleven o’clock, crawling round the M25, he put the phone in his bag and zipped the bag shut.

”That is enough for tonight,” he said.

On Monday morning, Marcus had the Beckenham canteen television on Sky Sports News with the sound turned all the way up. The photograph was on it twice, side by side on a split screen. Mourinho in August, three fingers, furious in the press room at Old Trafford. Rodríguez in October, four fingers, arrogant in front of the Stretford End.

Kirby stood in front of the screen with a slice of toast halfway to his mouth.

”James. You are famous.”

”I was famous before.”

”You are a different famous now,” Kirby said. ”You are United famous.”

Rodríguez was eating a bowl of cereal with his back to the television.

”I do not look,” he said. ”It is Rebecca’s minutes.”

***

Thank you to Sir nameyelus for the support.