Glory Of The Football Manager System

My mother answered on the 2nd ring. She never answers on the 2nd ring.

”If this is about the photograph, I have seen it.”

”Mum.”

”Mrs Kaur from number 14 showed me on her iPad yesterday before your Nathan rang. She has printed it off.” A cupboard door, and a cup going down. ”She is going to frame it. She says it is the best photograph anybody has ever taken of me, and I have to agree with her. I look very well in that hat.”

”There is a policeman coming round this morning.”

”He has been. He had 2 sugars and told me about his daughter’s netball.” She blew on her tea. ”And there is a car at the end of the road with 2 of them in it that I did not ask for, and Sheila keeps taking them biscuits.”

”I can send somebody up from the club.”

”You can send nobody up from the club. I lived on this road 30 years before anybody knew who you were, Daniel, and I will be living on it when they have forgotten.” She stopped. ”Are they still saying it? On the phones?”

”Some of them.”

”Is it bothering the lads?”

”No.”

”Then win on Saturday,” my mother said, ”and they can put that on their phones instead.”

Click. She always hangs up first.

I was stood at the edge of pitch 1 at Beckenham with the phone still at my ear, and Rúben Neves was stood 5 yards away with a ball under his foot, waiting for me to be finished.

”Your mother?”

”My mother.”

”She is okay?”

”She wants us to win at Wolves.” I put the phone away.

”Good.” He rolled the ball onto his instep and flicked it up and caught it. ”So I play.”

”You are on the bench.”

He let the ball drop.

”I am not tired, boss.”

”I know you are not tired. A week on Tuesday it is Eindhoven, and in Eindhoven I want you not tired.” I nodded across the pitch, where Mateo Kovačić was doing 10 yard sprints with Rebecca stood over him with a stopwatch. ”He starts. 60 minutes, and then it is you.”

Neves watched Kovačić turn at the cone and go again.

”First start,” he said.

”First start.”

He went over there, and when Kovačić stopped with his hands on his knees, Neves bent down next to him and said something in his ear, and Kovačić laughed with his head down.

”What did he say?” I asked Rebecca afterwards.

”He said do not be good, I want my place back.” She clicked the stopwatch off. ”Then he said but win.”

CRYSTAL PALACE: Pope. Wan-Bissaka, Dann, Tarkowski, Chilwell. Kovačić, Højbjerg, Eze. Rodríguez, Benteke, Zaha.

Bench: Krul, Ward, Sakho, Neves, Grealish, Townsend, Cartwright.

The Judas song got to Wolverhampton before we did.

There were 30 of them on the Waterloo Road when the coach came round the corner at quarter to 1, gold shirts and 2 in red, and they had it word for word. A lad in a Wolves bobble hat was holding his phone up to the window to film my face while he sang it. Deano pulled the curtain across next to me without being asked.

”Popular,” Zaha said from behind me.

”They have got it off the internet, Wilf.”

”Everybody has got it off the internet.” He leaned forward over my seat. ”Gaffer. If I score, can I do the fingers?”

”No.”

”Just 1 finger.”

”No fingers.”

Before kick-off Molineux puts Hi Ho Silver Lining over the speakers and all 4 stands sing the chorus back with their arms going. It came off the South Bank so loud that Chilwell stopped halfway through a stretch to look up at it. Our lot, packed into the corner, sang Glad All Over over the top and could not be heard, and sang it anyway.

PRRRRP.

Nuno had them in a back 3 with the wing backs so high they were playing as wingers, and for 20 minutes Matt Doherty lived in the space behind Ben Chilwell.

The 1st time, he reached the byline and cut it back low, and Pope smothered it at Jota’s feet.

The 2nd time, he put it on Raúl Jiménez’s head and Pope got 1 hand to it, tunk, onto the bar.

”WOLVES. WOLVES. WOLVES.”

The 3rd time, Chilwell got a foot to the cross, and it went straight up in the air and came down on Jiménez’s head 8 yards out, and he did not miss.

1-0.

Hi Ho again, all round the ground. In the front row of the stand next to our dugout a big man in a gold shirt stood up, turned round to me, and sang the Judas song on his own, word for word, all the way through, then sat back down and folded his arms.

”They have heard about you in Wolverhampton,” Bray said.

”Eyes on the pitch.”

[MATT DOHERTY. CONDITION 91%.]

”Ebere!” I got him on the next throw, 5 yards from my paint. ”You are on Doherty. Every time he goes, you go. Ben takes the winger.”

”And the middle?”

”Mateo has the middle.”

Eze looked across at Kovačić, 30 yards away, on his first start in 2 months, and then back at me. Then he went.

Doherty went 4 more times before half time and every one of them, Eberechi Eze was on his shoulder.

Mateo Kovačić had a bad 25 minutes and did not hide in any of them. Leander Dendoncker took it off him twice. Both times Kovačić went straight back and showed for it again with his hands out.

”He is okay?” Højbjerg shouted across at me.

”Give it to him.”

Højbjerg gave it to him. On 34 minutes Kovačić stepped in front of a Moutinho pass on halfway, took 1 touch, and slid it first time through the gap between Boly and Coady, and Zaha was gone.

Boly went through him 2 yards inside the area. The referee was pointing before Zaha hit the ground.

James Rodríguez had the ball under his arm before anybody else had moved.

”Wilf won it,” Kovačić said.

”Wilf always wins it,” Rodríguez said. ”I always take it.”

He put it down. Behind the goal, the South Bank whistled so hard it sounded like a kettle. Patrício went left, and Rodríguez put it in the top right, thwack, and did not celebrate. He walked back past the gold shirts behind our dugout with both hands in his pockets.

1-1.

”JAMES, JAMES, SHOW US YOUR FINGERS.”

It came out of our corner so loud it silenced the South Bank for a second, and the big man in the gold shirt turned round to look at them.

At half time Neves came and sat next to me on the bench in his bib before we went in.

”Doherty,” he said.

”What about him?”

”Ebere goes with him now. Every time. So when Doherty goes, Ebere goes, and there is nobody behind Doherty.” He was watching the Wolves players walk off. ”When I come on, I am looking at that grass. The moment Doherty goes.”

”Then look at it.”

On the hour, as written, Kovačić came off and Rúben Neves went on.

[MATEO KOVAČIĆ. CONDITION 88%. MATCH SHARPNESS 66%.]

”Good,” Neves said to him as they crossed.

”You told me do not be good.”

”I lied.”

It took him 18 minutes.

Doherty went forward. Eze went with him. Neves took the ball off Moutinho on halfway and hit it first time, thump, 50 yards, into the grass behind the pair of them, and Zaha was already running.

He took it on his thigh at full speed, came inside Coady and put it past Patrício with his left foot.

2-1.

”GLAD ALL OVER.”

Swsh. Zaha slid on his knees in front of our corner and did not put up any fingers. Somebody threw a scarf down to him, red and blue, and he put it round his neck and wore it back to the centre circle.

Grealish went on for Rodríguez with 20 minutes left. Rebecca’s card said 70. James went off with his hands in his pockets, to the same song.

Nuno went to a back 4 and put everybody forward, and the last 10 minutes were Wolves corners and Molineux on its feet. Tarkowski headed the first 3 of them away. Scott Dann went to ground once, in the 88th minute, to block a Jiménez shot, thud, and was on his feet before the ball had gone out.

PRRRP. PRRRP.

Nuno shook my hand at the tunnel and said well played and went in.

The big man in the gold shirt was still in his seat. He had stopped singing somewhere around 2-1. When I went past him to the tunnel he nodded at me, once.

Zaha had his phone out on the coach before we were off the car park.

”They have done the club Instagram, gaffer.” He held it up. Rats, snakes, a knife, JUDAS, rats. He scrolled down with his thumb. ”Look at this one, though. Somebody has done 4-1 in rats. 4 rats, a line, 1 rat.”

”That is a Palace fan.”

”That is a genius.” He sent it to somebody. ”I am sending it to your mum.”

”You do not have my mum’s number.”

”Nathan does.”

My phone went at 9 o’clock that night.

MUM. 21:02.

Mrs Kaur says the one with the scarf is her favourite. Tell him.

I told him. He put it on his Instagram with a picture of him in the scarf, and wrote for Mrs Kaur underneath, and by the morning it had more likes than the photograph of my mother.

Madrid were on the canteen television at Beckenham on the Sunday afternoon, during the recovery session, and 2 of my players had stopped doing their stretches to watch.

James Rodríguez was sat on the end of a table with his coat on and a plate of pasta he had not touched. Mateo Kovačić was next to him with a bag of ice strapped round his calf. They had both played for Real Madrid, and Kovačić had been in that dressing room until the summer, and neither of them had said a word since Coutinho scored in the 10th minute.

I brought a coffee over and sat down on the other side of Kovačić.

The referee went to the screen at the side of the pitch, the first time anybody had ever done that in a Clásico, and came back and gave a penalty against Varane.

”No,” Kovačić said.

”Yes,” Rodríguez said. ”He touched him.”

”He touched him a little.”

”That is a penalty now. A little is a penalty.” James watched Suárez put it away. ”In Spain now everything is a penalty.”

***

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