The Outside Of Everything

Chapter 16
The Local Football Team

It defies logic in a way, but The Fair One was never happier than when lost in an old Russian novel. You’d often be able to catch him absorbed in a care worn Penguin Classic. And on this particular occasion he was sat, soaking up the sun, outside our Lock Up, immersed in Gorky’s My Childhood, one of his particular favourites. Gradually though he was recalled to the land of the living by some gnashing and wailing coming from the direction of Our Friend Stan’s lock up. By all accounts he sounded in considerable pain.

Knowing when he was beaten, and very aware that Stan was trying to catch his attention, The Fair One sauntered over to see what was up. It’s the local football team, said Stan. The end is nigh, he moaned. Now that piqued The Fair One’s curiosity, for besides Russian novels another of his passions was the so called beautiful game. And he knew that within Stan that passion burned a thousand times more fiercely. So this was serious. The local football team may have been pretty much all washed up and hopeless, but Stan believed strongly in the merits of loyalty. Any suggestion the club might be on its last legs appalled Stan’s sentimentality. It’s the manager, said Stan. He’s had a better offer, and the season’s about to start. Nobody else will touch the job with a barge pole. We’re doomed, said Stan.

The Fair One also had a soft spot for the local football team. He religiously went out every week, come what may, selling raffle tickets and collecting pools money to help the club cause. To be honest, they had been in desperate financial straits as long as I could remember. It never seemed to change. The leagues might be given new names, but the struggle to survive continued. The Fair One’s affair with the club started way back though, when his aunt took him along to a charity match there. A team of showbiz bods was slugging it out with a team of has-been pros. The main attraction though was a fleeting appearance by a certain Rod Stewart, with whom The Fair One’s aunt was somewhat besotted. She shared the same feather cut and all. She loved the man. So much so that when Rod the Mod did have a run out, the aunt also had a bit of a run out onto the pitch to follow the wee man. Rather than follow his aunt as she was escorted out of the ground, The Fair One stayed on, and something got into the blood stream.

So in a sense he shared Stan’s pain. He hated the idea of the local team going under when elsewhere there was so much money floating around in the game doing no good whatsoever. He thought we should do something. We were always for the underdog after all. I think at first we were unhelpfully flippant, but deep down we knew he had a point. The trouble was the team was full of enthusiastic amateurs. Lads with hearts of gold, prepared to give it a go, but there was no direction. And, as Stan said, who’d want a dead end job managing that lot?
Who indeed? Well, The Fair One had one of his ideas, and seemingly out of the blue mentioned a name we hadn’t heard in a while. I met him recently at a party, said The Fair One. My sister introduced us. A bit of a sad spectacle really, said The Fair One, but he was once the most beautiful in the beautiful game. . Yes but, we chirruped in response, what’s that got to do with the price of fish? You’re surely not suggesting he’d be a decent manager? Everyone knows the guy’s washed up, a wreck, a curio to be wheeled out at parties. Sad, but that’s the case, we said. Yes, yes, yes, The Fair One bit back more animatedly than was healthy, that’s the point. He needs a purpose in life, a challenge, a way of channelling his talent. He’s got nothing to do now but drink and regret. Just think, said The Fair One, we could be helping a legend and the local team at the same time.

Well, we didn’t have any better ideas, so we shrugged and said why not? After all, we’d grown up admiring the legend’s silky skills and his assured ability to orchestrate a match with seemingly little effort bar a few deft passes and flicks. It didn’t matter which club you supported you had to admire what he could do. And then he threw it all away. He hated the media. He hated managers. He hated the business side of the life. He just wanted to play football. And a bad knee injury put paid to that just when he seemed to have got his head together. Now, well, it was the old, old story. Too much time on his hands. So, why not? What was there to lose?

The Fair One said his sister would have the legend’s number, so maybe we should get her to give him a call and have a chat. Well, Soul Sister Number One was game, though she refused to go alone to any meeting, naturally enough. Well, to cut a long story short, the legend took the bait, although he initially laughed in our faces, but got back to us and said what the heck! We told Our Friend Stan the plan, and he laughed in our faces, looked us in the eyes, saw we weren’t joking, and said what the heck? So with expectations so low, we could hardly fail. And sure enough we managed to get the legend to come down to the local team’s training ground, to meet Stan and some of the lads. While we suspected our legend was doing his best not to laugh at the sad absurdity of the whole thing, especially when Stan said we’d love to have you on board, but we couldn’t really afford to pay you. Nevertheless something must have clicked, for against all odds the legend said he’d come along to the next training session, and spend some time trying a few things out. So began one of the more unlikely relationships in the world of sport.
It didn’t last long, and no one really thought it would. How could it? But the local team’s season that year got off to, ahem, a kick start. The legend took a series of training sessions. Showed a little of what he could do, managed not to sound patronising. Got the guys thinking about what they were doing, rather than just lumping the ball upfield and lamping an opponent. One of Stan’s old contemptibles, a retired PE teacher, saw to some of the fitness fundamentals. And the legend won over all the hearts and minds by turning up consistently over a period of six to eight weeks. The Fair One joined in a few of the sessions, and Soul Sister Number One cheered from the sidelines in a vintage tracksuit which was most becoming. The Outside of Everything could boast of having a decent outside left in its ranks at least. Anyway, all good things have to come to an end, and the legend being the legend he was got restless, and worried about being tied down. It had done him good though. He’d cut down on the drinking, and got some self respect back. Of course in life’s game of snakes and ladders he soon slipped back. A spell on the after dinner speaking circuit did him no good whatsoever, but that was his affair.

So Stan’s team lived to struggle through another season. The involvement of the legend had raised the team’s standing, and they ceased struggling to attract a new manager or coach, because for a brief moment they had acquired a certain cachet of glamour. Normal service was soon resumed though, and a journeyman pro took over the reins and soon had the guys back to old, comfortable non-league ways. The team hoofed the ball around. The fans groaned and bemoaned their lot. The club limped from one crisis to another, and the so did the legend. Life goes on, and The Fair One shrugged and went back to his Russian novels. Did I mention that he had a cat called Gorky?