Glory Of The Football Manager System

Ivan Perišić sat down without being asked. At 11 o’clock in that corridor he had stood up straight for 4 minutes.

”In Italy they would not have said it to me.”

”In Italy they would have known and told you in April 2021 when it went.”

”Yes.” He said it flat. ”Yes, that is what they would have done.”

Tk. Somebody went past that door and did not come in.

”Mister Walsh, I am 29 years old and I have just found out I have got a bad leg.”

”You have got an old injury on a good leg and a fitness coach who has found it 4 years before anybody else would have.”

”And she will stop me playing.”

”She will stop you playing about 8 times a year and you will hate every one of them and so will I.” I had my hands flat on that desk. ”And you will be 33 and still playing, and the men you are 29 with will not be.”

He looked at the wall for a bit.

”Where do I sign.”

Scritch.

He signed at 14 minutes past 2.

3 years. There is no signing on fee and there was never going to be one and his agent did not ask me about it once. That has happened to me 1 time in 14 months and this was it.

Sarah lodged the registration at 2:31 and had it confirmed at 3:04, and she printed the confirmation, put it in a drawer, and carried on with her afternoon.

We did not need a deal sheet. 2 hours to spare, on a day when 4 clubs in that division used one.

IN: I. PERIŠIĆ.

OUT: J. NAVAS.

25 names. 8 club-trained. 17 association-trained.

Steve Parish came down at 4 o’clock and stood in a car park with me for the last hour of a transfer window.

He has done that every August for 8 years. He cannot sit down for the last hour and he will not pace about in front of staff, so he goes and stands on tarmac.

”Anything coming in?”

”Nothing.”

”Anything going out?”

”3 telephone calls about Aaron this week and I have not returned any of them.” He had his hands in his pockets. ”Danny, I want to say a number to you and then I want to never say it again.”

”Go on.”

”180 million out. 58 in.” He was looking at pitch 1. ”8 months ago we were sat in my office deciding whether we could afford a physiotherapist.”

Bzz.

We both looked at our phones at the same time.

Everybody in football does that at 5 o’clock on the 9th of August. 20 chairmen and 20 managers and about 500 agents, all looking at a screen.

16:58. 16:59.

Nothing came in.

17:00.

At 5 o’clock the transfer window of the Premier League shut for the first time in its history before a single match had been played, and 20 clubs stopped being able to fix anything, and every squad in England became the squad it was going to be until January.

Everton got all 3 of them.

A winger off Shakhtar for nothing, a centre-half out of Barcelona for 28 and a half, and a midfielder on loan, and the last of the 3 came up on a phone via a deal sheet at about 6 minutes to 6 while Steve Parish and I were still stood on that tarmac.

Dougie told me all 3 of those were coming at 5 past 6 that morning, in a sentence I barely listened to, because I was thinking about a hamstring.

Steve Parish took a breath out.

”Right,” he said. ”Now it is football.”

I did the last thing at 6.

Ivan Perišić had gone to a hotel and his agent had gone to an airport and Sarah was still in the building because Sarah is always still in the building.

Thump. Thump.

I went and found Antoine Semenyo on pitch 3, on his own, in the last of that light, hitting balls at a mannequin from the left touchline.

18 years old. 40 minutes on Thursday morning and a sentence off Sarah at 11:20 that turned out to be a fortnight early.

”Antoine.”

”Gaffer.” He put a ball down. ”I saw the news.”

”You are not starting Saturday.”

”I know.”

”Do you want me to tell you why?”

”No,” he said, and he said it fast and he meant it. ”I know why. He has done it 300 times and I have done it 0.”

Then he picked another ball up.

”Can I ask you something instead?”

”Go on.”

”How long has he got?”

I stood on that pitch and looked at a boy of 18 with a bag of balls at half past 6 on the day the window shut.

”3 years,” I said. ”Maybe 4.”

”Right.” Antoine Semenyo turned back to his mannequin. ”That is about what I thought.”

I went back in and Sarah had put the sheet on my desk with everything on it, the way she has since April 2017.

SATURDAY 11 AUGUST. FULHAM. CRAVEN COTTAGE. 3 O’CLOCK.

Craven Cottage holds about 25,700 and they will get about 24,800 into it.

6 days ago this football club played in front of 84,617 people under an arch. On Saturday afternoon we walk out at a ground on the Thames with a wooden pavilion in the corner of it that has been there since 1905, in front of a crowd smaller than the Palace end at Wembley.

38 matches. About 8 of them are the ones people talk about and the other 30 decide the season, and I have got a squad that has spent its entire summer preparing for the 8.

Underneath the fixture Sarah had written 4 lines, because Sarah always writes the 4 lines.

Promoted 3rd. Play-off final, Wembley, 26 May. Beat Aston Villa 1-0. 85,243.

I read that last number twice.

Fulham’s last competitive football match was at Wembley Stadium in front of 85,243 people.

That is 626 more than watched us win a trophy on the same grass on Sunday. They had 10 men for the last 20 minutes of it and they held on and they went up, and it was the first time that football club had ever won a match at Wembley in its history.

The man they beat that afternoon has been in my building since June.

Jack Grealish played 90 minutes in that final. He had a shot saved that would have taken it to extra time. He got kicked by 2 different men and 1 of them went off for it, and when it finished he stood on that pitch and did not go down the tunnel for a long time, and there are photographs of it that I have seen and that he knows exist.

He is 22. His ankle is 6 days into a 10 to 14 day grade 1 and Rebecca has had him on a bike since Monday.

He is not playing on Saturday. He has known since Tuesday, and the only thing he has said to me about any of it was to ask Rebecca on Monday whether the bike counted towards the 14 days.

I put that sheet in a drawer at 20 to 7 on the day the window shut, and outside on pitch 3 an 18-year-old was still hitting balls at a mannequin in the dark.

38 matches. It starts tomorrow night without us and it starts for us at 3 o’clock on Saturday afternoon, 6 miles up the river, at the smallest ground in the division.