Glory Of The Football Manager System

[Wembley Stadium. Sunday 5 August 2018.]

Emma got up at half 6 and made 2 plates of eggs and put mine in front of me and sat down opposite with hers, and neither of us said anything for about 4 minutes.

Then she said, ”You have not watched it.”

”No.”

”Episode 6.”

”I know which one it is, Em.”

Tk. She put her fork down.

”I am not going to nag you today of all days.” She picked it back up. ”But I am going to say 1 thing and then I am not saying it again until Tuesday.

”Your mother is 61 and she has known for about 4 days that you have not seen it, and she has not rung you about it, and she is not going to.”

”I know.”

”Good.” She got on with her eggs. ”What time is the coach?”

”Half 11.”

”Then eat that, because Rebecca will know.”

The coach came down Wembley Way at 5 to 12 and it took 22 minutes to do 600 yards.

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM-BOOM-BOOM.

That drum has been at every away end since March and it was on that road at 12 o’clock in the afternoon with about 400 people round it.

”WE ARE PALACE! WE ARE PALACE!”

You could not see tarmac. There was a bloke on a lamp post with a Morocco flag with WALSH on it, and about 20 feet of red and blue smoke, and a steward walking towards it slowly enough to arrive after it had gone, and a lad of about 9 on his father’s shoulders holding a sign that said MY DAD SAYS WE WERE 14TH.

Christian Benteke was 3 seats behind me with his headphones round his neck.

”Gaffer.”

”Christian.”

”This is a home game.”

”It is.”

”No.” He was looking out of that window. ”I mean this is a home game. That is not a cup final crowd out there. Look at them. They have brought the drum.”

Nya Kirby, 17 years old, was 2 rows further back with his face about 4 inches from the glass and had not blinked in about 90 seconds.

The stadium at 1 o’clock is a different building to the one at 3.

We went out in suits and it was 27 degrees and the whole thing was empty and white and about 4 times the size it looks on a television, and 40,000 seats had a flag on them that the club had put out at 8 in the morning.

Michael Olise walked to the middle of that pitch on his own and stood on the centre spot and looked up at the arch.

He is 16. He has been at this football club since he was 9. He was not going to play.

Ellis Cartwright took a photograph of him doing it and did not tell him and has never shown him.

Sarah came and stood next to me on the touchline with a folder under her arm.

”Right,” she said. ”Pitch is 2 metres wider than Selhurst. Marcus wants Pierre told about it a 3rd time.”

”He has been told twice.”

”That is what I said to him, and he did the face, and I have told him no.” She turned round and looked at the empty seats. ”Daniel.”

”Go on.”

”61,400 of these are ours.”

”When do the gates go?”

”20 minutes,” Sarah said.

They came through those gates at 20 past 1 and they did not stop for an hour and a half.

Hnnnn.

Tk. Tk. A seat going down 200 yards away and you can hear it.

That is the noise a stadium makes when it is 3 per cent full, and it is a sort of hum, and it is the worst noise in football because it is the sound of a thing that has not started.

By half 1 there were 20,000 in and it had turned into weather.

Rrrrrr. 20,000 people talking is not a noise, it is a pressure on the side of your head.

Then at 2 o’clock it stopped being weather and became something else.

I have been in that stadium 5 times as a manager. 4 of them were last season and 2 of those were finals we won.

I have never heard it like that.

84,617. That is the number Nathan gave me at 6 o’clock and it is on a sheet in my office. 84,617, in a 90,000 seat stadium, on the 5th of August, for a match with no prize money in it.

Not a pound. There is no prize money in a Community Shield and there never has been. Every penny of the gate goes down the pyramid, to grassroots clubs, to pitches and nets and 300 quid towards a minibus.

I have known that for about 15 years. It has never meant anything to me until this year, and this year I have got my own name at the top of a programme with 6 scouts and a psychologist in it, and a boy of 16 whose mother has driven him from Hammersmith since he was 11.

Clk.

I gave them the sheet at half past 1 in a dressing room under the west end of that stadium, with the air conditioning going and 30 men in it and somebody’s music on low.

Nick Pope.

Aaron Wan-Bissaka. James Tarkowski. Mamadou Sakho. Ben Chilwell.

Rúben Neves. Pierre-Emile Højbjerg. James McArthur.

Jarrod Bowen. Christian Benteke. Wilfried Zaha.

I read it out and I got to the 11th name and the room did not move.

Nobody made a noise. Nobody looked at anybody. 30 men in a room who had all worked it out on Friday night and had spent 2 days not saying it.

Wilfried Zaha was sat under the peg with his boots already on and both hands flat on his thighs, and he nodded about half an inch.

He has not played a match since the 15th of July. He has not asked me a single question in 3 weeks.

He got me on my own by the door 5 minutes later.

”Gaffer.”

”Wilf.”

”3 weeks ago you told me I am playing 34 games this year, not 50.”

”I did.”

”Is this 1 of the 34?”

”It is.”

”Right.” He was looking somewhere past my shoulder. ”Because I have been doing the sums since Beckenham and I make it 34 games and 3 of them are Manchester City, and if you are spending 1 of them here I want to know you meant it.”

”Wilf, I wrote your name on that board before any of the other 10.”

He looked at me properly then.

”You have never done that.”

”No.”

”Right,” Wilfried Zaha said, and went and sat back down, and did not say another word to anybody for 40 minutes.

Bench. Tim Krul. Wayne Hennessey. Scott Dann. Ibrahima Konaté. Axel Tuanzebe. Tyrick Mitchell. Nya Kirby. Eberechi Eze. James Rodríguez. Andros Townsend. Jesús Navas. Alexandre Pato. Connor Blake. Antoine Semenyo. Michael Olise. Ellis Cartwright.

Bzzz.

Marcus put the last thing on the wall at 2 o’clock and there were 3 slides on it and he did 90 seconds on all 3.

”City. Bravo in goal, not Ederson.”

Bray looked up. ”Say that again.”

”Claudio Bravo. Guardiola has done it in this fixture before and he has done it today.” Marcus clicked. ”Walker, Stones, Laporte, Mendy. Fernandinho captain, Bernardo Silva, and Foden.

”Mahrez, Agüero, Sané.”

”Foden,” Bray said.

”Phil Foden. He is 18 and he has started a Community Shield, and if you want to know how good Pep Guardiola thinks he is, that is your answer.”

”And De Bruyne?”

”Not in the squad. He went to a World Cup with Belgium and he is not back.” Marcus shut the laptop. ”And boss, before you say it. Do not let anybody in this room be pleased about that.”

”Nobody in this room is pleased about that,” I said. ”They have won this league by 19 points and they have left out the best midfielder in England and they are still going to have 65 per cent of the ball.”

”70,” Marcus said.

”They can have 70.”

Christian Benteke, from the back, without looking up from his boots.

”They are not having Fernandinho.”

Rebecca stood up at that point. She does that about 4 times a season and every man in the room went quiet for it.

”2 things and then I will sit down.”

”Go on.”

”27 degrees, no cloud, and that pitch has been watered twice.” She had a clipboard she was not looking at. ”Every one of you drinks at every single stoppage, and I do not care who is on the ball or where it is.

”And Wilf.”

”Rebecca.”

”You have not played 90 minutes since the 15th of July and you are not playing 90 minutes today, and I have told him and he has agreed it, and I am telling you in front of everybody so that nobody has to have a conversation about it at 70 minutes.”

Wilfried Zaha did not turn round.

”How long have I got?”

”You have got as long as your legs have got,” Rebecca said, ”and I will be the one who tells you, and it will not be him.”