Hand of God

56

After everything that had happened before the match, it was a relief to watch a game of football, even though that wasn’t the way I’d decided we were going to play it. Because right from the kick-off our players were quickly on their weakest player — the midfielder, Mariliza Mouratidis — like they held him personally responsible for keeping us all in Greece, and closing him down like they were a bunch of liquidators.

‘I hope this works,’ said Simon. ‘You know what European refs are like. They hand out cards like Japanese businessmen. And after what just happened with that Irish bastard, Backward — he’s probably dying to send another of our lads off.’

‘On the contrary,’ I said. ‘I think that what happened might just work in our favour. Backward already looks stupid because he didn’t know the rules. He’ll know that in his bones now. There’s no point in looking like a cunt as well.’

But two extra-hard tackles in the first fifteen minutes stood out from the rest. Mouratidis ran at speed onto a long ball from Roman Boerescu which landed just inside our box, with the ball bouncing just a little too high for him to control; he looked up, waiting for it drop a little so he could perhaps head it onto his foot, with no idea that Kenny Traynor — all six foot three of him — had already taken off and, like Mercury himself, was now heading through the air, fist first.

Kenny punched the ball cleanly and fifteen yards clear of his box, at least half a second before his trailing knee caught Mouratidis on the side of the head and clotheslined him. Fortunately the inevitable Greek howls and demands for a penalty were wasted on the Irish referee and the officials who’d had an excellent view of what had happened. Anyone looking at the incident would have said that Kenny had touched the ball first and behaved with an almost foolhardy lack of concern for his own safety, so much so that everyone in the City dugout was relieved to see him get up again. Everyone but the Olympiacos supporters, that is, who were outraged that a penalty was not going to be given.

‘Nice one,’ I said. ‘That should give the lad plenty of pause for thought.’

‘You fucking Irish malakas,’ someone not very far behind me was shouting at the ref. ‘You want to wear your glasses instead of keeping them up your arse.’

Mouratidis stayed flat on his back for at least two minutes; and after treatment off the field, returned to the game with no obvious signs of injury. It was perhaps unfortunate for him that the next incident involving the boy was to compete for a fifty-fifty ball with Gary Ferguson, who has the hardest head in British football. The man could head a wrecking ball and still walk away with a smile on his face. The two players jumped for a high ball, with the difference between them being that the later slow-motion replay showed Gary’s head arriving with more energy and malice aforethought than a rock from a trebuchet; it was almost as if he had regarded the football as an unfortunate impediment to the delivery of a real Glasgow kiss. And Gary knew what he was doing; he seemed to head his way through the ball, before his head connected with the young Greek’s forehead.

Once again Mouratidis went down as if felled by a Tyson uppercut only to find that Gary, who knew very well how appearances can influence weaker-minded referees, had already beaten him to the deck and was now holding the crown of his head and writhing on the ground as if trying to roll himself up in turf.

Anxiously I glanced at the linesman and was reassured to see his flag had stayed by his side.

‘Christ,’ muttered Simon as both physios sprinted onto the pitch amid a virtual storm of whistled air. ‘I hope that crazy Scots bastard is all right.’

‘He’s not injured,’ I said. ‘A head like Gary’s could breach a castle wall. He’s just wriggling his way clear of a potential yellow, that’s all. You mark my words, Simon. Just as soon as he sees the ref’s hand is staying away from his top pocket he’ll be on his feet again, like nothing happened.’

A minute later my prediction was fulfilled and, still holding his head as if he could feel his hair transplant starting to work, Gary came back to the line with Gareth Haverfield. I got up from the bench, grabbed a bottle of water from the kitbag and stood beside them. Gary took the bottle from my hand and, with the plastic tit between what few teeth were left in his head, muttered back me, ‘I’ll be very surprised if the fucker gets up from that, boss.’

‘We don’t want the bastard off the field,’ I said. ‘I told you. We just want him nervous when he’s on the ball. Like it was filled with fifty thousand volts. So that the next time Prometheus runs at him he’ll think it’s better just to stay the fuck out of his way.’

To my relief, Mouratidis got up and started to hobble back to the line. I glanced anxiously at Trikoupis to see if he was about to send another man on in the young Greek’s place, but none of the Olympiacos players were even warming up.
‘Got it,’ said Gary, and tossing the bottle behind him he ran back onto the pitch.

‘If this carries on,’ observed Simon, ‘it won’t be Mrs Mouratidis who’s in hospital, it’ll be her son, too.’

‘That’s their problem,’ I said. ‘Ours is winning this game.’

Once again Mouratidis went back onto the field, apparently still none the worse for wear. I stayed at the edge of my technical area shouting instructions, most of which were lost under the noise of the crowd; but when I saw Gary speak in the ear of Prometheus the African kid turned, caught my eye, and then nodded very deliberately as if he understood exactly what to do.

A minute or two later he ran onto a powerful roll-out from Kenny that looked more like a snooker shot it was so well placed, and a split second later Prometheus was sprinting straight up the centre of the pitch like Wayne Rooney on ketamine — the raging bull way he used to run straight at people when he first joined Man U after leaving Everton. Mouratidis kept pace with Prometheus for ten or fifteen yards before making a futile, almost childish attempt to get his arm in front of the young Nigerian who wasn’t having any of it and even seemed to shrug him off like an old overcoat, whereupon the Greek fell beneath the feet of another chasing player and didn’t move again until Prometheus had completed his run, by which time the ball was in the back of the Greek net.

The goal was so quick I didn’t even see it. The best goals are often like that, over before you know it, which is why managers often look so dozy in the dugout. Sometimes you can’t see the very thing that you’re looking for. With the Olympiacos crowd behind their goal carrying on regardless with their Neanderthal chants, it was only the Panathinaikos fans going wild with delight to see their greatest rivals a goal down after just twenty minutes that tipped us off that we were now one-up on the night.

‘He’s only fucking well scored,’ yelled Simon.

I turned away from the pitch and double-punched an invisible dog at my knee before I found myself held around the waist by Simon Page in a bear hug of alarming power and then lifted high into the air. He put me down just in time for me to catch Prometheus as he launched himself into my arms, and it was fortunate that I’m a fit man as the combination of these two celebrations would surely have injured someone weaker.

‘Thanks, boss,’ yelled Prometheus. ‘Thanks for believing in me, and for making me believe in myself.’

‘Now go and score another and remind these Greek bastards how good you are,’ I yelled back at him.

Slapping the club badge on the breast of his shirt Prometheus sprinted back onto the field and I told myself that it was me and not our new technical director who’d helped the boy find his winning streak again. This is all football management’s about: making players feel good about themselves enough to play the best they can. To do that you need a bit more than just a hairdryer, and anyone who tells you different is full of shit.

‘Four — two,’ yelled Simon.

Twenty minutes later, on the edge of half time, Prometheus struck again when Jimmy Ribbans’s powerful twenty-yard strike ricocheted off their goalpost and, without a moment of hesitation, the Nigerian boy launched himself headfirst at the rebound and scored — an astonishing diving kamikaze of a goal that was every bit as courageous as it was spectacular: 4–3.

‘I don’t know what you said to him on that fucking boat,’ said Simon. ‘But it worked.’

‘All I did was give him a history lesson.’

‘He’s like a different player. Now if he can do it once more I’ll have his baby.’

Trikoupis was looking rattled now. Summoning his team captain, Giannis Maniatis, to the touchline, he gave him some animated instructions, seemingly unaware that half time was just minutes away and that he had actually moved several feet beyond his technical area and was now standing on the pitch. The sixth official, William Winter, pulled at the Greek manager’s shirtsleeve, trying to bring him back into the technical area, but the Olympiacos manager was having none of it. He wrested his arm away from Winter who pulled at him again, and, perhaps because he was English, Trikoupis turned and shouted in his face.

I’m pretty sure that Winter didn’t speak more than one word of Greek; but then he only needed to know one word; malakas is a word that all of the officials are well aware of and while they had been briefed by UEFA to be on the lookout for it from some of the players and of course from the crowd, none of them had expected to hear it from the Greek manager himself.

Calling the sixth official a wanker to his face would have been bad enough but Trikoupis now shoved him away. Winter took a couple of tiny steps backwards, and then fell flat on his back. Now it’s a fact of the modern game that nearly all players will, from time to time, take a dive in the hope of a foul or a penalty, but it’s rare in the European game that you see an official go down as easily as Winter did. I’ll always remember watching a match between Newcastle and Southampton when Mohamed Sissoko put the referee on the deck and, to all the world, it looked like it was the ref who had taken a dive. Fortunately on this occasion the lino was right beside William Winter and immediately raised his flag to summon Backward who, advised of what had happened — or at least appeared to happen — and doubtless pleased that he could send someone else off who wasn’t actually playing, ordered Trikoupis to the stands.

Trikoupis kicked a plastic water bottle away in disgust. The bottle flew through the air and struck a uniformed policeman in the face. At which point the cop took Trikoupis by the arm and led him off the pitch. The Olympiacos fans went wild with anger, while those of Panathinaikos went wild with delight.

‘Is he arresting him, or what?’ I said.

‘I fucking hope so,’ admitted Simon. ‘I would love it — love it if that bastard spent the night in the cells.’

He and I tried to contain our glee but it wasn’t easy; while the Greeks came pouring out of their dugout to remonstrate with Mr Backward and the cop, Simon and I retired to our own dugout, occupied our mouths with chewing gum and water bottles and observed the proceedings from a safe distance. This was just as well as a red flare came sailing through the air and landed close to the corner flag in our half.

‘You can tell a lot about a country by the way they protest against the inevitable,’ mused Simon. ‘I mean, it’s obvious that referee isn’t going to change his mind about that one. But the bastards seem determined to argue it.’

‘You can tell why Zeus got so pissed off with these people and was so fond of throwing thunderbolts about the place,’ I said. ‘They’d try the patience of a pope.’

By now the referee was surrounded with Olympiacos coaching staff and players and it wasn’t long before the assistant manager, Sakis Theodoridou, had been sent to join Hristos Trikoupis in the stands.

‘That’s their half-time team talk well and truly fucked,’ said Simon. ‘I guess the physio will have to do it now. Or maybe that Mrs Boerescu who did the kiddies’ tea before the match. Christ, that’s a nice-looking woman. She can give me a bollocking any time she wants. Just as long as my bollocks are in the right place, which’d be resting comfortably on her chin.’

Another burning flare came sailing through the air as if somewhere a ship was in distress and, completely recovered from his severe fall, Mr Winter walked away from the mêlée that was still berating the referee, and kicked the flare off the pitch, where a security man attempted to put it out with an extinguisher.

‘This is beginning to look serious,’ I said. ‘Let’s just hope that twat Backward doesn’t abandon the match. Not with us two-up on the night.’

‘He wouldn’t do that, would he?’

‘He just might, you know. Last time a match between the Greens and the Reds was abandoned was as recently as March 2012 when the Greens set fire to the stadium.’

‘Fuck me,’ said Simon. ‘I know it’s important, football. And I know you want players who will fight when there’s nothing at stake, but that shouldn’t ever apply to the fucking fans.’