Soccer Supremo - A Sports Progression Fantasy

12.

Monday, April 17

RetiredRed

What a win! We. Are. Going up. Said we are going up!

Come on! AFC Wrexham are a handful of games from the Premier League. I never thought I would live to see the day!

ButteryCrumpets

Who do we want in the playoff final, boys?

Stoop

Chester.

RetiredRed

Sheeeeeeet!

No chance! They’re out. Collapsed, they have.

Folded like a pack of cards.

BeardedWonderwall

Folded like a cheap suit.

Folded like a cheap tent.

RetiredRed

Folded like a cheap suit in a cheap tent!

EnergonBot

Like Icarus, they flew too close to the sun and the heat melted their wings. Energon Zero Sugar gives you wings.

This message was brought to you by Energon, proud sponsors of the Red Army podcast.

BeardedWonderwall

Crumpets! The stupid bot is posting crap again. I thought we agreed it wasn’t allowed in the locked channels?

ButteryCrumpets

Shit. Not sure how that happened. I’m as good at running a channel as Chester are at keeping a clean sheet.

RetiredRed

lol

I hear Ipswich is lovely at this time of year. Support their economy, I say.

DubaiGuy

Have you gentlemen seen the highlights of Chester versus Ipswich? There was some rather dubious refereeing in that encounter.

Let’s just say I’m glad I didn’t have any money on it.

RetiredRed

I’ve just watched the video. Holy smokes! Best looks like he’s about to erupt. Fair play to him for keeping it together.

BeardedWonderwall

He reffed that match like Max used to bully him at school! Genuinely shocking.

A ref tries that at The Racecourse, there would be a riot.

BrokenGround

Lads, I’ve been activated!

Stoop

Yessssss!

BrokenGround

Briggy is setting up a meeting with the Brig tomorrow. It has to be something big for Max to call him out of retirement.

***

Tuesday, April 18

I woke up, did some boy things, did some man things, did some Max things.

Down in the living room, I pulled a sheet from the countdown timer.

It claimed there were now only 39 days until my wedding. That was all kinds of terrifying, so I bravely chose to ignore it. I turned to something even worse, my hand-written schedule of the absurd seven days that would start this coming Saturday. I peeled off a Post-It note and read:

Sat 22nd, Men vs BirminghamSun 23rd, Women vs Wolves (Last league game)Tues 25th, Men vs Crewe (Cheshire Cup Final)Weds 26th, Women vs Macclesfield (Cheshire Cup Final)Sat 29th, Men vs Preston (Last league game)After those, I would get a few days off before another mad run of matches that would include the men’s playoffs, the Youth Cup Final, and potentially a playoff for the women. A stress-coated cherry on top of an anxiety-filled cake. Soggy bottoms guaranteed.

”Jesus fucking Christ,” I mumbled. This workload was unsustainable, right? This season had weirdly been one of the less draining ones of my career (mostly because for most of it I hadn’t been overly bothered where the men’s team finished) but it was unsustainable.

I did a few slow laps of our sofa.

If I won the Youth Cup a second time, I would back away from managing those matches in future. I would let other coaches get experience and glory.

What about the women? Being the women’s co-manager was great for earning XP and being on the bench allowed me to use my perks in matches, which we would need even more in the WSL. I would stay as co-manager and chip in during the tough early weeks of life in the top tier, but then I would ease myself out of the situation.

In an ideal world, I would find someone like Jay Cope to manage the youth team, and I’d find someone like Sandra Lane to be Jay’s assistant for the women’s team. Chester FC needed a pipeline of top-class managers, and the Max Best Universe needed a pipeline of top-class managers. I was building a network slowly, surely, but I had an idea about how to turbocharge that process.

First, though, I had a meal to prepare. They say revenge is a dish best served cold, so this dish would be one served by Best - that’s me - at zero degrees Kelvin, which is what scientists call the temperature at the away end at Carlisle United.

Steve Steel, the cheat, was going down. We would gather information, build a case, and his demise would happen slowly, then all at once.

The dish would be dark but delicious.

I still had the Post It note between my finger and thumb. It was from Emma.

This Friday, dinner, Angle, 7 p.m., my mate’s birthday!!!

Right, yeah. That’s why I was thinking about meals and dishes. Emma had booked a table in the fanciest restaurant in the area, which was great, but it would make things hairy when it came to me affording Deformation 2 before the Birmingham match. I’d done some calculations and I would be cutting it tight. I had to buy the perk, though; it could be the difference between Chester getting to the playoffs or not. The stakes were two million quid - fancy steaks could wait.

I brought the note to the fridge and placed it there. Friday was ages away. This morning I needed to meet the Brig, Briggy, and Dylan to discuss our next steps, and it had to be somewhere quiet, somewhere remote, somewhere the narcs wouldn’t have wire taps all over the place.

I texted the Brig.

Me: There’s an industrial park in Oakenholt that’s perfect for a clandestine meeting. Little cafe there does builder’s tea and sausage baps for truckers. Let’s meet there at oh-eight hundred hours. Bring a hi-vis jacket so we don’t stand out.

Brig: Sounds glorious. Let’s meet in the kitchen in ten minutes to discuss codenames.

Emma was having a lie-in, so I closed the door quietly behind me, and walked along our garden path. The spring warmth was very much waking things up. The tulips were popping and the willow was doing bits. Had it made its move too soon? To my left were a couple of pampas grasses we’d planted.

One absolutely loved his new life and had shot up to two metres tall and had metre-long fronds sticking out of the top. These fronds were fluffy and delightful and caught the sun and wind in fascinating ways, very much giving us what gardeners call ’year-round interest’. Emma and I called this delightful being Wibbers.

The other grass was half the size of its mate and had never shown any interest in putting on a display. It was a selfish, self-absorbed little prick. I called it Emiliano.

I went through the gate and crunched across the gravel outside Ruth’s house. I thought about going round the back to a fence that I could jump over, but decided to be normal. As I was walking to the front, Briggy turned up. I held the door open for her like the classic English gentleman I was.

The kitchen was warm and smelled of freshly-made coffee. The Brig looked like he had been doing push-ups since 5 o’clock. He made Briggy a coffee without her needing to ask. Ruth looked less daisy-fresh, but gave me a smile. ”John tells me you have used the word clandestine four times in six messages. Do you want me to leave?”

”Nah,” I said. ”It’s your house. We’re waiting for Dylan, anyway.”

The Brig poured tea from a pot into a Chester mug. ”Dylan will not be joining us, Max. You wouldn’t pick Dylan to play in a high defensive line against a team with fast forwards, nor would I pick Dylan to work on a case involving gambling.”

”What?” I said, worried. ”I know he likes a flutter, but...”

The Brig added milk to the tea, stirred it, and pushed the mug towards me. ”Is he a problem gambler? No. Is he susceptible? Yes. If this is to do with a gambling ring...” He shrugged.

”No Dylan. Fine.”

Briggy said, ”Do you think it’s about betting?”

I sipped the tea, which hit the spot big time. ”It’s the most likely, right? We want to think the sport’s totally clean but there was that case in Turkey a couple of years back where they suspended a ref for betting on matches. That got some headlines on its own but then they found that three-fifths of refs had betting apps on their phones and a quarter placed bets on a regular basis. Major, major scandal.

”If it’s not gambling, it’s something political. The Premier League doesn’t want Chester to go up. The EFL want to punish us for making them look like fools. I mean, the other angle would be someone from Ipswich paying the ref, but I’d be amazed if it’s that. It seems easy to find out. Hack his phone, check his bank for shady deposits. I’m gonna get Pradeep and Spectrum to look into this ref’s games to look for strange decisions like we got yesterday. We’ll attack it from the football angle, you from the real-life spy angle. How much will your side cost?”

Briggy said, ”Less than you’d think.”

I wanted a ballpark figure. ”Fifty grand?”

Briggy pulled a face. ”Not even.”

The Brig said, ”If it’s one man acting alone and the investigation ends there, the work will be inexpensive. If he leads us to a gambling ring and you want to learn more before we pass the information to the authorities, that would add to the cost. If there is, indeed, a global refereeing conspiracy aimed at bringing Chester down, as I have heard in many a pub, you can imagine that pulling on all the strands would cost rather a lot.”

I had to smile. ”Global conspiracy against Chester.”

Ruth said, ”I have to say, you handled the match with surprising maturity, Max. Everyone in the box was fuming. MD nearly punched a wall. You were the calmest man in the stadium.”

”No, I was raging. Boiling over. But I’d spent the morning talking about how it wouldn’t be that bad if we lost, so when the plot started to unfold I was thinking it’s so much better for this to happen now than in the final match of the season. If I was plotting against me, I’d wait until then. Because think about it - if we lost to Ipswich and Birmingham, the last match would be an irrelevance. You could sit back and watch us fail, risk-free. Which means the people behind it don’t know anything about football, which made me think it was the Football Association.”

Briggy laughed. ”Sometimes you’re very funny, Mr. One Hundred Percent.”

”And the thing is, if it is a global conspiracy, or it’s the FA giving me a punishment beating, or it’s the Premier League trying to wreck my reputation, or if it’s Alan Turner doing it to discredit me, or even if it’s a betting syndicate that wants to guarantee certain results, like, whatever it is, it’s going to be bad for the sport. It will be a scandal and it will be toxic. If results are fixed, if you can’t trust that the matches are being reffed fairly, sponsors will drop out, fans will stop coming. How much damage will there be? It’s hard to say, right? Sports often brush off that kind of crisis but not always.” I took a big swig of tea. ”In the current environment, Youngster will be a one hundred million pound player. If I can convince him to move to another club, that’s big money for Chester.” I took another sip. ”And big money for me. Ten million quid maybe. If the market collapses, I might get three, four, five. I’m doing all right from the game but it’s still small potatoes. I want to get proper rich before I start pulling at the Jenga tower.”

Briggy gave the Brig a strange look. If I had to guess, I’d say she was awestruck, as though the Brig had predicted what I was going to say.

Ruth leaned back. ”You thought all that while the ref was giving penalties for phantom handballs?”

”Yes. But I’ll tell you what really made me nearly lose perspective. Helge Hagen should have scored two goals yesterday. A full-back scoring two against a title-chasing team could have been the catalyst for him to get called up for Norway’s Euro 28 squad. He needs the summer off, so it’s not a tragedy if he isn’t chosen, but the fucking referee doesn’t get to play God with my players.”

Ruth said, ”That’s your job.”

”You’re goddamn right.” I drained my mug. ”Who’s in charge of this?”

Briggy pointed. ”The Brig Dog.”

Ruth snorted. ”John! New nickname!”

I pointed from my old bodyguard to my new one. ”The Brig Dog and Briggy Doggy, crime fighters extraordinaire.”

Briggy gave me a cold look. ”Sometimes you’re very funny, Mr. One Hundred Percent. Sometimes you are not.”

***

Over breakfast, I got dozens of texts from people all around Europe, all saying the same thing. They had watched the Ipswich match at first impressed, then confused, then furious. It was frightfully kind of people to write and it did make a difference. It made me realise that Chester fans weren’t the only ones who could see what an injustice the match had been.

Two of the messages stood out. One was from the Slovakian national team’s goalkeeper, and the other was from the Slovakian Messi.

The goalie was Marek Masarik, who had been CA 155 the day that Slovakia had played at the Deva Stadium. Phenomenal shot-stopper, amazing at penalties. He described himself as a ’reluctant goalkeeper’, since his real dream was to play right midfield. Fortunately for him, life had put him where he needed to be. Masarik was third-choice for Burnley, who were about to be relegated. His contract was running out. He was still Slovakia’s number one despite being 37 years old, and was probably about as good as Owen Elmham, with a similar ceiling (PA 165). If we could agree wages, I could get him for no transfer fee. Next season, I would have two of the best goalies in the Championship and I wouldn’t need to think about the goalie slot for another year.

As the saying goes: mmm, mmm, mmm! Yes, pur-lease!

Then there was Leo Los, the Slovakian Messi. His career had exploded, then fizzled, and then he had become something of a forgotten name. He was a technician in a world of thuggish beefy boys. He was an artist in a world of AI slop. He had another year on his contract, so there was a very high probability that his current club would sell him cheap. (Or they would risk losing him for nothing when his contract expired.) Leo was a failure, a forgotten prodigy, a waste of talent, but there was always the possibility his career would be revived by the European Championships. After all, he had made his name at Euro 24.

It was all too easy to imagine him scoring a couple of goals in the upcoming tournament and reminding clubs that he existed. What would I pay for a 22-year-old AM RC with PA 161? Given that he was probably around CA 140, and that I would back myself to use him well... 8 million quid. Yeah, I’d drop 8 million on him right now, no hesitation. Twelve months from now he would either be a good Premier League player or someone I could sell for a profit. Either way was fine with me.

I wondered if the messages from the duo were, in part, reminders that we had met and that I had liked them as players. The old ’come and get me’ plea. Was I deluding myself? They were top internationals. Then again, whatever happened in the final days of the season, Chester had established itself as a team that would challenge for promotion to the Prem. The timing was interesting and the players were appealing. I could bulk up the squad in two key areas before going on my honeymoon!

If I acted fast, was there a chance I could pick Leo up for relatively cheap? As a Championship team I would be quoted his true market value. If we accidentally became a Premier League team, the price would get a few zeroes added to the end.

Since they were important players for their national team, neither would require an ESC slot. I sent the Slovakian Messi a text.

Have you got time for a chat?

***

After lunch I met up with a group of people I felt sure had never been gathered in one place before.

There was Luisa (Henri’s girlfriend and Chester FC coach); Carmen (a super cute Spanish teacher who also taught English and helped us with translations); Pradeep and Spectrum; Tyson.

”Thanks for coming, everyone,” I said, looking around the little meeting room. ”I’m not sure I’ve ever been in here before. Isn’t that crazy? We’ve grown fast.” Through the window I saw football pitches as far as the eye could see, and to the left, the Deva. ”I’ve got a mission for you.” The boys sat up straighter. I tapped my phone. ”I read an article last week that explained how there’s a glass ceiling for female coaches. They can’t get UEFA Pro licences because there isn’t enough capacity in the existing courses to accommodate them, no new courses are coming online, plus the courses are crazy expensive. The article was about a Spanish coach who seems to be amazing and she keeps getting job offers in America, in Saudi, in Europe, but she can’t take them because the requirement is to have a UEFA Pro licence.”

Spectrum was pulling a face. ”Sorry, boss, but what’s this got to do with Ipswich and the referee?”

I frowned. ”Nothing.”

He looked at Pradeep, who seemed just as bewildered as his mate. Spectrum continued, ”I thought this meeting would be about our response to that robbery yesterday! That theft!”

”Bro, can you take a deep breath? This meeting isn’t about that, okay? It’s about an opportunity to corner the market in elite coaches in a way that benefits Chester and benefits me. By which I mean, us.”

”But Max!”

Spectrum and Pradeep were clearly itching for a fight. Luisa and Carmen were interested in my theme. Tyson was trying to impress one or both of the beauties by looking cool and by presenting the optimal view of his face. I got to my feet and walked to plop my arse onto the table next to Tyson. The women looked at me; I looked at the women.

”Spectrum,” I said, in a dreamy voice, while mostly looking at Carmen, ”you know I’m a big fan of The Wire. I’m watching it again and this time the end hit harder than ever. It’s the very final scene, where one of the characters goes to a chainlink face and looks out onto Baltimore. He sees flashbacks of everything that’s happened plus the same exact scenes but with new faces. The idea is that things will keep going as they’ve gone before, but slightly worse. There’s an unspoken plea: won’t someone break the chain? Who will end this cycle?”

I closed my eyes as I pictured a new way, a better way.

In an even dreamier voice, I said, ”In that story, no-one has the courage or the strength to do what’s needed. No-one has the courage or the strength to look past referees and administrators and moneymen to say, what needs to be done?” I shook my head. ”I believe that if we keep building, keep improving, keep looking to the future, we can make a real, tangible, sustainable difference to people’s lives. I don’t want to look back, but forward, and I ask myself, what can I do, with all my skills and resources, to effect change? Lasting change? And what I can do today is start a process that might unearth the female Pep Guardiola, might shake loose the female Sagarna from her bottleneck, and if the universe is feeling incredibly kind, we might even unleash the female Max Best.”

Carmen was looking at me with dewy saucer eyes. Luisa looked like she wanted to jump me right there and then. I gave Tyson a slap on the shoulder - he looked as though he had just come from the Road to Damascus. Spectrum looked at the others, cleared his throat, then sat back. ”Er, okay. Soz.”

Having won battles that Spectrum and Tyson didn’t even know they were fighting, I got up, languidly, and walked round the table. ”Back to the article I read about what genuinely seems to be an elite coach. She can’t progress her career because she needs the top badge. She can’t get the top badge until she gets a top job. She can’t get the top job without the badge. I call this a Catch 22 situation, because it’s one that I can exploit to make 22 million pounds.”

I smiled at Carmen; she smiled back. Christ, life was good sometimes.

”Every FA only has 20 slots available on its courses every two years. As the women’s game develops, so the demand for courses goes up. Right? If 20 used to be the right number for the men’s game alone, now it should be 40. Yes? But there’s no sign of that changing and for every FA the priority will always be men’s football because that’s where most of the money is. But I’ve got connections at the Welsh FA and in Gibraltar and I’m more than willing to give top jobs to top women. What I want to do is find all these frustrated female coaches and make a deal with them. Come to north Wales, come to Gibraltar, work for my clubs, and while you’re boosting the UEFA coefficients of those countries and raising the standard of the league, you’ll get onto their Pro courses. Oh, and I’ll give you a good salary and pay for the course. That’s a win-win-win-win-win scenario, isn’t it?”

Luisa said, ”Remind me how this is good for Chester.”

”The ones who work at Saltney, Flint, or Connah’s Quay will chip in here, too, right? And they’ll be coaching the players we loan to those clubs. If Flint Town has an elite coach, we can send them three players a season who will get minutes in the Welsh Prem and Europe. Ditto Gibraltar.”

Carmen said, ”You want to find the best female coaches in Spain? That is why I’m here?”

”Yes. Here’s the plan. The stats team are going to develop a tool to track and rate the female coaches in Spain and Portugal. Win percentages, wins per Euro spent, how do records improve over time, that sort of thing. We’ll cross-reference that with the licence data from the FAs. We should be able to find out who has a B licence, A, and so on. Ideally we’ll get a list of 20 coaches with the A licence whose teams got steadily better but are now stuck. Then Luisa and Carmen will call around and get character references. The top 10 will get an invite to Chester this summer. We’ll pay the flights, hotels, and give them some masterclasses. We can dangle a closer look at Bestball if that’s what it takes to get them here. The whole thing is so I can see them up close. The top ones will be offered the chance to join my fast-track.”

Luisa seemed to like the plan. ”You’ll give them the chance to manage men’s teams?”

”If they’re tactically on the ball, yes. I’m very happy with Jay but on the whole I’d probably prefer to have a woman in charge of Chester’s women. That’s going to be one of the best jobs in the world very soon.”

”Why Spain and Portugal?” said Tyson.

I nodded towards Luisa and Carmen. ”Because of our resources and because there are geographic and linguistic advantages to having a Spanish person in charge of a club in Gibraltar. By the way, I’m thinking about a future newspaper headline when the top three managers in Gib are women. They’ll call it She-braltar. Good, right?”

Luisa said, ”No. That’s not good. Are you getting 8 hours of sleep?” She turned to Tyson. ”He chose Spain first because the woman he read about is Spanish.”

I realised that was true. ”Yeah, okay, I suppose I don’t have as much imagination as I like to think. If this goes well, we can expand it to Germany and Norway and all kinds of places, but there’s a definite opportunity in Spain and Portugal. Those countries produce some of the best coaches in the world so it’s an obvious and legit place to start.” I closed my eyes and thought of a day when the three clubs in Gibraltar would have three Iberian versions of Sandra Lane smashing clubs into the league stages of various European competitions. This scam was going to make me millions and millions of pounds. I opened my eyes and did my best impression of a sunflower, radiating light and life into the environment. ”Do you know what an elite coach is worth? Tons of talent is trapped and there is a way for me to get my hands on the cream of the crop. Dozens of pro-level coaches are out there and if we make it easy for them to progress their careers, we’ll benefit.” I clapped my hands. ”I propose we take a couple of days to think about it and on Thursday we’ll meet again to come up with a proper plan. Good?”

The group agreed and got up to leave. I asked Pradeep and Spectrum to hang back for a minute.

When the others had gone, Spectrum shook his head. ”It’s amazing how you always keep one eye on the future even when we’re in the middle of a hurricane. If I were you, I would be stewing on yesterday and thinking about the next seven days.”

Pradeep said, ”Seven days, three must-win games, two cup finals.”

The finals were in the Cheshire Cup. ”We’ve been preparing for those matches all season,” I said. ”This time next year, where will we be? I don’t know, but I know that I’d love to have three elite Spanish coaches on speed dial, three coaches who owe me a favour. It makes sense, right? The minute we stop moving forward is the minute our descent into oblivion starts. Okay, while you’re thinking about how to track the most promising reserve and youth team managers based on shitty public information, I’ve got another task for you. I want you to go through Steve Steel’s history and look for anything strange. How many yellow cards he gives out, in what minutes does that happen, which teams does he favour, whatever. If there’s a way to compare that to what the betting markets expected for those events, amazing. If that’s too hard, let’s do it on a forward-looking basis. When he’s due to ref, scrape every bit of betting data you can get, then let’s look into everything that happens that’s out of the ordinary. Anything you can look into, investigate it.”

Spectrum’s face had lit up. He turned to Pradeep and high-fived him. ”Yes! We’ll take him down! Project Prick Hunt initiated!”

”Not sure about the name,” I said. ”Make sure you get 8 hours of sleep.”

”Wait,” said Pradeep. ”What was all that you said before? You gave us a big monologue about not looking into the referee because we had to find the female Pep Guardiola!”

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on NovelFire. Report any occurrences.

I laughed - I had forgotten that whole speech already. ”Yeah, I was just big-dogging Tyson. Women like it when you’re authentic and care about things.”

Spectrum threw his hands up. ”So do you care or not?”

I eyed him. ”How is that in any way relevant to your tasks? Right, listen, I’ve given you a lot of work. You’ve got DOVE, a trip to Ireland to set up more cameras, Project She-braltar, Project Enormous Revenge. Do I need to start thinking about hiring more people? Can you train Tyson to do things?”

Spectrum said, ”Tyson’s good. He’s smart and he can code.” Pradeep made a noise. Spectrum rolled his eyes. ”You’re such a snob! What, were you never 18?”

”When I was 18 my code was already far more tight. Tyson’s is sloppy at best.”

I pushed myself to my feet. ”Maybe we can put him on the fast track to get his Pradeep Pro licence.”

Pradeep said, ”The slow track, in his case.”

Spectrum slapped him on the arm and they fell into bickering. I left them to it. If they needed more staff, they would tell me.

***

Friday, April 21

Extract from Pyramid Schemers, the original and best podcast dedicated to the 72 teams in tiers 2-4.

Mike: Thanks once again to SlowVPN for sponsoring this predictions pod, where Rocky and I are looking ahead to the final week of the regular season. We’ve covered League Two. We’ve covered League One. It’s time to talk Championship, and we’ve decided to start with the playoff race.

Rocky: That’s right. We more or less know that Wolves and Ipswich will be battling for the title, we more or less know that Crystal Palace will finish third. But there is an almighty battle for fourth, fifth, and sixth. Now, I have to confess that when I made my own predictions they came out one way, but then I looked at the betting markets to see what they had to say and I was blown away.

Mike: Mate, I think we’re about to describe the exact same experience. Are you about to mention Chester?

Rocky: I’m about to mention Chester. After their frankly surreal loss to Ipswich, they fell to 8th. That would seem to be them out of the playoffs, given that there are only two matches to go. But across the board, the betting companies are offering odds that suggest that Chester will finish 4th! It made me look a lot more deeply into why that might be. If you had the same experience, what were your takeaways?

Mike: Mostly, it’s because of the fixtures. I hadn’t quite realised who was playing who in the final two matches. We’ve got title chasers playing against playoff teams and we’ve got playoff teams needing to win local derbies. It’s all quite chaotic but here’s what I would boil it down to. Chester have 74 points right now, and two games remaining. On a count of three, tell me how many points you think they’ll have when the league finishes next Saturday. One, two, three...

Both: 80.

Mike: Haha, great minds! 80 points has historically put teams in 4th or 5th, and with Luton needing to play Wolves on the final day, you’d imagine 80 points puts Chester 4th.

Rocky: I went into the permutations to a ridiculous degree, I have to confess, and there are quite a lot of stylistic reasons why I fancy Chester to beat Birmingham City in Birmingham and why they will beat a Preston team that doesn’t have anything to play for on the final day. The bookies might be slightly overrating their chances of finishing 4th, but I would be amazed if Chester don’t make the playoffs.

Mike: Which is an astonishing thing to say. So we have Ipswich and Wolves in the top two places, Crystal Palace third, Chester fourth. Who do you have in fifth?

Rocky: Luton have probably done enough to land there.

Mike: Same.

Rocky: So it’s a toss-up between Norwich and Coventry for the last playoff berth.

Mike: Mate, I can’t call it. Charlie Dugdale has been an Expected Threat monster in recent weeks, but Cov have the potential to blow teams away and they have that insane goal difference. I think I’m on the Cov bus. The Cov train.

Rocky: The Coventrain. Choo choo!

[They giggle like 12-year-olds.]

***

By 5 p.m. I was getting worried about hitting 5,000 XP in time to make it to Emma’s dinner, so I moved around Bumpers Bank making sure I hoovered up all the XP I could. Some randos were setting up an eleven-a-side match on our second 3G pitch, so I asked if one of the teams wanted me as the manager. They lost their minds with excitement, but decided it wouldn’t be fair to the integrity of the league.

I mean, amazing answer but it didn’t help me achieve my goal. I wondered if I could grab a quick 50 XP in the morning, but it was really impractical - we had to get ready here and drive to Birmingham. I couldn’t stop Sealbiscuit at a five-a-side pitch on the way to one of the most critical games of our season!

It was looking like I would be late for dinner, but potential deals for the Slovakians had moved amazingly quickly.

Marek Masarik was interested in joining us but had asked for £30,000 a week, which was £1.5 million on a one-year contract. With my huge war chest, I could afford it, and if we wanted to win the Championship we needed to swim in those waters. In a way, you could argue it was cheap given that the guy had 70 international caps, but 30 grand a week was a worrying number. It was three times what the club’s current top earners were getting. If I shattered the wage ceiling to such an extent, I would need to dish out hefty rises to the rest of the squad, and the disparity between those at the bottom and those at the top would be hugely stretched, which could be horrible for team Morale.

As a compromise, I had offered him an effective 20 grand a week with some of it disguised as a signing bonus so that we could write a lower weekly wage on the contract. That was a hefty pay cut from what Marek had been earning in the Prem, but he hadn’t played enough league football to command big wages - we would be a chance for him to get minutes and potentially impress the big teams once again.

Marek had been following our progress and liked what we were doing. Marek, Mad Owen, and Sticky as third-choice would be as good a goalie cohort as any Championship team. He had asked for the weekend to think things over. I got the feeling that he would watch our game very closely to see how we played and most importantly, if we won.

It’s happening, Max. We’re getting there!

As for the Slovakian Messi, Leo’s club had turned down my £4 million offer. When I immediately went back with 4.9, they had sighed - via fax, which was impressive - and said ’how about 6.2 million?’

I had instructed Secretary Joe to wait until Monday, then fax a £5.9 million offer. Leo’s terms were more reasonable; he would get £22,000 a week.

The deal felt right. I would revive his career, he would boss the Championship, and we would make a good profit on him.

Oh, and my wages would get a bump, too.

If Leo was on 22,000 a week, it would only be fair that my wages should be 23,000. That was almost 1.2 million a year. I would finally be paid more than the average for the division!

***

As I moved from pitch to pitch trying to progress deals, watching randos play, glad-handing the parents of key prospects, I saw things that warmed the cockles.

One was our under 18s in mixed training with their counterparts from Saltney. Their training match was fast, furious, tactical, and skilful. There were five senior coaches watching and every couple of minutes there was a break in which the coaches took groups of players aside to impart information. There were Welsh coaches giving tips to English lads and English coaches giving pep talks to the Welsh. Absolute Chesterness.

***

On a small-sided pitch, Luisa was trying to get Gabriel out of his goalscoring slump by giving him extra Finishing training. This was the problem with strikers - they lost their minds when the goals dried up. Football had evolved slightly from the days when a team’s striker scored the bulk of its goals - Gabby’s hold-up play, link play, and ability to stress defences with his movement were far more important to the team than his ability to score a one-inch tap-in, but there didn’t seem to be any way to make him believe that.

Luisa’s latest innovation was an interesting one - she had summoned poor Henri all the way from South Wales to deliver a masterclass. Four hours one way, an hour of training, four hours back.

First-time half-volleys, headers, dinks, scoops, thunderbastards - the session had the lot.

I hugged him and told him he smelled nice. I almost felt bad about my plan to dodge his stupid stag party.

Almost.

***

On the next pitch, Meredith Ann was in a free-kick competition against Wallace Wells, using the awesome ’jumping wall’ I’d spent 30 grand on. Meredith seemed to be winning until Wallace challenged her to switch feet. He was two-footed, which Meredith might not have fully realised. ”Nope,” I said, intervening. ”I don’t want Meredith doing things in training she won’t do in games. If you can’t beat her left foot, Wallace mate, don’t challenge her. Come at the king, you best not miss, okay?”

Meredith smiled, but said, ”I’m not the king. Not yet.” She tilted her head. ”I will beat Max Best’s left foot. This I can do.”

”Come on,” I said, moving Wallace out of the way so I could take a kick. ”I’m not that good.”

I took a shot, left-footed.

There was a brief silence.

”Meredith,” said Wallace. ”Let’s take up a different sport. Pie-eating. Cheese rolling. Frog jumping.”

Meredith didn’t smile, but glared at the top corner, where I had cracked my shot so precisely it brushed both post and crossbar. ”I am here to practise. If you are not up for the challenge, you do you.”

Wallace flushed and walked away. I actually couldn’t believe it. Was he quitting?

He came back with another bag of footballs, dropped one in front of him, and eyed Meredith. ”Watch this.”

***

Then my favourite moment. Zach Green was on a 7v7 pitch yelling at a gang of absolute rando kids. I had no idea who they were or how they had been assembled, but they were all CA 1.

He gave tips to everyone, of course, but was especially interested in the defenders.

”Hey, Bobby! Don’t dive in! Stay on your feet and stay goalside unless you’re really sure you can get the ball!”

”Bobby, be aggressive, but be smart!”

”Bobby! You can’t get the ball every time!”

”That’s it, Bobby! Yeah! Hell, yeah! Scuse my language, fellas. But whooh! That’s what I’m talking about!”

I went past, put my hand on Zach’s back for a few seconds, watched the session, then gave him a few pats and told him he smelled nice.

I was gonna miss the weirdo.

***

At ten past seven, I hit my XP target, rushed to Car2D2, and whizzed along the roads towards Eastgate.

The traffic was shit, so it was half past by the time I parked and strode into the grand dining room.

Angle was inside an old-fashioned but luxurious hotel, and in the olden days I would have hesitated to go there in a shit hoodie and tracksuit bottoms. The other patrons were older, gammony types. I felt a lot of eyes on me, and the vibes weren’t positive. As I approached our table, I noted that Emma and her friends had made an effort to class up. Ah, well.

”Hi,” I said, taking the empty seat.

Emma seemed torn between being mad at me for being late and not wanting to start dinner on a sour note. She introduced her friends, which was handy because although we’d met before in Newcastle, if they couldn’t play right wing it was hard to keep track. I remembered that the friend called Jackie was the birthday girl. Emma eyed me. ”Are you all right, babes?”

”Er... what?”

”You’re not normally late, you didn’t text, you look a state.”

I extended my fingers one by one. ”I’m not normally late... I didn’t text... I look a state. Right on all three counts!”

That broke the ice wonderfully, but Emma didn’t smile. ”Max, really. Are you okay? This was bad timing, wasn’t it?”

”Ah, blame Jackie’s parents for the timing.”

”What’s going on?” said Jackie.

One of the dudes said, ”Chester are gunning for promotion to the Premier League and they have a must-win game tomorrow. It’s all very tense. I remember last time we were out together, Max had just been sacked by Grimsby. Now look where he is! It’s amazing.”

The first course arrived, which was surprising because I hadn’t ordered anything. Emma spotted my confusion. ”We’re all getting the set menu, babes.”

I eyed the plate. It looked very fancy, very amazing, very delicious. With regret, I turned to the waiter. ”Who’s in the kitchen today?”

”It’s Chris, Max.”

”Oh, top. Can you apologise but ask him for the Soccer Supremo menu?”

He smiled, said it was no problem, and reached to pick up the dish. Emma said, from the corner of her mouth, ”You can leave that.”

”Classy,” I said.

”Shut it,” she said, loading the next blob of food onto a spoon. ”You’re in a shit hoodie; you don’t get to give lectures.”

”Fair,” I said, looking around at the nearby tables. A lot of people looked away when they saw me looking.

”What’s the Soccer Supremo menu?” asked the second dude.

I focused on him as best as I could. I still hadn’t actually bought Deformation 2 yet and was itching to do it even if I wouldn’t be able to see it in effect until tomorrow afternoon. ”High glycemic foods. The night before a match I’d normally eat stuff you’d think of as trashy. Bagels smeared in honey is a personal fave. And I’ll avoid stuff you would think of as healthy. No high-fibre veggies, no high-fat food, nothing like oats. It’s all about having energy in your legs at kickoff, and not having your body working hard to break down the stuff in your stomach. If you eat the wrong stuff you’ll be leggy, lethargic. Oh-oh.”

A guy wearing a chef’s apron was striding across the room. This was Chris Frey and he was one of the best chefs in Chester. He had a round, friendly head. He always had a tiny smile like he was laughing inwardly about the shitty, primitive palates of the rest of the world. ”Max!” he said, shaking my hand before I could properly worry about what he wanted and before I could stand up. ”How’s it going? You well? There’s Emma! Who else have we got?”

”Emma’s friends from Newcastle,” I said. ”It’s Jackie’s birthday but we don’t want a cake and a song, thanks.”

”Haha! We don’t do that here. It’s a classy joint.” He was eyeing me with unusual intensity.

”Guys, this is the head chef, Chris.”

Emma said, ”He’s the Max Best of cooking.”

”Whoa!” I said, hands up. ”Let’s not get carried away. If he was the Max Best of cooking he would go to France, get a baby carrot, bring it back and turn it into an award-winning pumpkin. If he was the Max Best of cooking he’d be creating new meats and he wouldn’t smother everything in butter. What Chris does is art. What I do is magic.”

Emma applauded; Chris laughed. Jackie said, ”What’s that about butter?”

I explained. ”I come here once a month at least and every time I’m amazed by how good the veggies taste. One time, when no-one was looking, I took a piece of broccoli away in a Tupperware and went straight to a high-spec lab near Cambridge. They looked at it under all kinds of microscopes and they showed me what they were seeing. You know in a normal atom you’ve got, like, electrons whizzing around a neutron? Or is it a proton? Anyway, there’s this vast expanse of nothingness that’s quite poetic, quite profound. Well, on this broccoli, that space was completely filled with butter.”

Chris was laughing hard. ”How am I supposed to make things taste good without help from my little yellow friend? It’s like you said, I’m an artist not a magician.” He laughed some more, then leaned closer, eyes unblinking. ”Big game tomorrow, isn’t it? Are you going to play?”

”I hope not, but I need to be ready.”

”Three o’clock kickoff?”

”Yes.”

He still wasn’t blinking. He rubbed his mouth and chin. ”I can work with that.”

I put my hand on his waist and looked up into his eyes. ”Chris. Don’t do anything special. I just need the nutrients. Slop some white rice onto a plate. Put any extra thought and care and magic into the dishes for these guys, okay? I’m gonna come back after the season’s over and I’m gonna pig out, believe me.”

He nodded slowly a few times but I got the feeling he wasn’t really listening. His face crumpled. ”I’m a nervous wreck!”

”Mate,” I said, rubbing his back in a friendly way. ”It’s Birmingham City. They’ve spent tens of millions making their team worse. They’re a shambles. Sideways and Backwards FC, and the fans hate it. They want to see attacking football and this manager’s close to the sack so the players are gonna say fuck it, let’s ignore that guy and get the fans back onside. They will lose discipline, they’ll come at us, and we will pick them off.”

”What if they don’t lose discipline?”

”Then our season is over,” I said, solemnly.

Chris stared straight ahead for so long his skin cracked and flaked and he literally crumbled to dust in front of our eyes. Emma said, ”Maaaax!”

I smiled, but realised that not all the looks I had been getting were hostile. Sure, there were probably some customers annoyed at how I was dressed, but probably most of the glances were from Chester fans who were just as worried about the next seven days as Chris Frey. I stood, dragged Chris a few yards back towards his kitchen, then cried out, ”Chester fans, to me!”

Some of the kitchen staff came over, some customers left their tables. Chairs scraped, cutlery was downed. Emma and her gang decided to join the party. I gripped Chris by the shoulder, shook him, and gave everyone a pep talk.

”My favourite TV show is The Wire. It’s an epic story about people who want to get to the top so they can change things, but the only way to get there and stay there is to keep everything the same. The last scene shows how the wheel of time turns and every arc repeats. That’s not our story. We do things right and we get rewarded. Every season’s better than the last, which is not something you can definitively say for The Wire. Today I was negotiating with two international players about joining the club this summer. Serious players want to play for Chester! Serious coaches, too. We’re plotting to become the go-to destination for ambitious young managers. We’re close to starting on the new stand and we’re gonna have a huge dental clinic, a tattoo artist, a hairdresser. It’s crazy how fast things are improving.

”We’re better than Birmingham and we’re better than Preston and the gap’s only getting bigger. We’re gonna win two Cheshire Cups in the next week and we might win the WSL2, with the Youth Cup to come. This is a golden age, an age of glory. So eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we shoot back to 5th on goal difference. Okay?” I clapped my hands. ”Let’s get back to work on these dinners. Use cutlery from the outside in, slurp from the side of your spoon not the front, be mindful of your knife-work. Sam, your wine pairings are on point but I don’t want to hear you recommending a good port, okay? There are no good ports. Port is awful.”

Chris tipped his head back and took control of the situation. ”Okay, thanks, Max. I feel better now.” He looked at his customers. ”We have some fantastic ports. Ask Sam for more information.”

The crowd dispersed and everyone went back to their tables or their duties but with a pep in their step. Before I sat, Emma gave me a hug. ”What?” I said.

”Why didn’t you say you were late because you were doing transfers?”

I smiled. ”Because then I’d have to admit I took time out to show off during a free kick battle.”

”Huh,” she said, slipping away from me. She settled onto her chair and said, ”Who else wants port?”

***

While the others were eating something ornate from the tasting menu, I got a text from Sandra.

No new injuries today. Did you decide about Magnus?

We were happy with our plans for the Birmingham match. We had already beaten them this season, 2-0 at the Deva, though Brum were a different beast at home. Our 3-4-2-1 was effective against their 4-2-3-1, and with my two deformations I would be able to get really funky with my in-game tweaks. Maybe I would move Pascal and Wibbers to be wide forwards, playing ahead of Lewis and Cheb. That had the potential to be absolutely devastating!

But I couldn’t keep shying away from the fact that Magnus was pulling away from Christian Fierce in terms of CA. Hell, if I wanted to maximise the team’s CA, even Helge would get in ahead of Christian. The Norwegian full back was 121 now. Cole Adams was 134 and he was a very competent left-sided centre back. Magnus was CA 132, twelve points ahead of our club captain.

I might still have been tempted to keep Christian in the line up because of his leadership, but we had Peter, Zach, Owen who could wear the armband.

In the end, it was the new perk that was decisive. If Magnus was in the back three, I could move him up to the DM slot and still have one tweak I could use with the forward line. Or I could move Magnus to right back and invert him. He would give us more solidity on the right if that was needed, or I could use his presence on the right as justification to nudge Cheb one zone higher. Meanwhile, Magnus would play in midfield when we had the ball. It would be uber attacking, but if we needed to chase the game, having Magnus on the pitch gave us so many options.

Me: Magnus is in. Peter captain.

If my calculations were correct, Birmingham’s CA would be one point higher than when we had played them at the Deva. Not much progress for all the money they spent in January! I expected them to have an average CA of 118.

With Magnus instead of Christian, ours would be 137.7.

If we played our best, we would win, simple as that.

Ah, but was it that simple?

With a scowl, I did a search to see which referee had been assigned to the match. It wasn’t Steve Steel; I unclenched my fists. If we played our best, we would win.

***

Saturday, April 22

EFL Championship Match 45 of 46: Birmingham City versus Chester

Extracts taken from Seals Live

Boggy: And so begins a momentous week in the history of this football club! Two must-win league matches for the men, one must-win league match for the women, plus one cup final each! Has there ever been a seven-day run like this one? How are you feeling, Robin?

Robin: I am a bag of nerves! It’s a great stadium, though. Many home fans have stayed away as a protest at how their season has fizzled out but the ones who are here are very loud and they’re getting behind their players. It could be a long afternoon for the Seals.

Boggy: Aren’t they all? One surprise in the lineup is that the club captain Christian Fierce has been left out. He’s on a very strong bench along with Max Best and Colin Beckton. No kids from the youth team this time. This is as serious as it gets for Chester. Waiting for the whistle... and we’re off!

***

Extract from the voluminous first draft sent to the editor of The First Footballer In Space: The Pascal Bochum Story.

Eat well.

Sleep well.

[Don’t think about the stakes.]

Go through your normal routines. Prepare. Check. Double check.

[Don’t think about how the entire world is watching.]

Feel confident. Feel relaxed. Look around the dressing room and see a formidable team. Warriors and athletes, technical players, clever players.

Then as soon as you touch grass, your legs turn to lead.

[Oh, shit.]

***

I couldn’t believe how heavy I felt. What was happening? I had prepared so well. Why was I so slow? In the warmups, I took shots that dribbled feebly across the grass. I tried to clip a cross-field pass that barely went half the intended distance.

It wasn’t just me. Lewis Lamarre scuffed some corner kicks and mumbled something like, ”Why did I invite my peeps?”

Peter Bauer, our captain for the day, continually glanced towards the VIP area in the main stand, though I never discovered who was on his mind.

Someone passed to Joel Reid and the ball bounced off his shin. ”Won’t get to Wembley like that,” he mumbled.

In the pre-match briefing, Max was moving his magnets around explaining some of the things he might ask Magnus to do later in the game. I couldn’t follow what he was saying. At one point he slid my magnet out to the wing and explained something, but all I saw was his mouth moving. Sandra followed it up with some more info but she spoke with her back to me, so I couldn’t even see her lips move.

Then it was time to go out onto the pitch.

To play.

Win and we would jump right back into the playoff spots. Win and we would be four matches from the Premier League. Fame, fortune, glory.

Lose...

Lose and our summer holidays would start in April. There were rumours Max was already negotiating with multiple top-class international players. Would our jobs still be here when we returned?

***

Extract from Deva Station’s match review, recorded in regular instalments, and in selfie mode to avoid running into rights issues.

J: All right, quarter of an hour gone here at St. Andrew’s. It’s been a cagey affair so far. Some might say turgid.

Smakk: Turgid, yeah. Turdage. It has been a stinker.

J: Neither team has got going. Brum are so cautious, but we’re just playing flat-out bad. Almost everyone is shockingly bad.

Smakk: It’s the nerves. The tension. We know they’re brilliant players but they can’t even play simple passes. Did you see Lewis just then? Played a simple pass five yards off-target and it went out for a throw-in. It’s the nerves. I can’t blame them but I hope they snap out of it.

***

Seals Live

Boggy: Half an hour gone. It’s still nil-nil, and the way things are going, this match could go for another thousand hours and neither team would score.

Robin: It has not been a classic.

Boggy: All you listening back home, why not get in the chat and tell us about the worst game you’ve ever been to?

***

Pascal

Even as I was toiling, I was wondering how I would possibly explain what I was experiencing. Most parts of our machine were defective. Owen Elmham was unfussily doing his job, and we were perfectly able to defend. We could hold our shape, track, tackle, intercept, and clear. But when the ball was at our feet, we turned into bunnies in the headlights.

Had it only been me, I might have gone to the side and asked to be subbed off. Maybe I had an illness. Maybe I had accidentally eaten broccoli the night before. But it was a team-wide problem.

I frequently looked to the touchline. Max looked unimpressed, of course, but didn’t seem to want to change anything. Magnus had not gone into his strange new roles. I had not been asked to go wide - as far as I could tell.

Perhaps Max would make a change just before half-time?

I waited.

The referee blew his whistle.

I screamed with frustration. Why was I so shit? Why were we so shit?

Max was going to have to give a speech worthy of Al Pacino in Any Given Sunday to wake us up from our collective slumber.

***

Deva Station

J: It’s half-time, and that was rancid.

Smakk: 45 shocking minutes. I can’t remember a single chance for either side.

J: Listen to the boos. That’s not us, is it?

Smakk: That’s Birmingham.

J: There’s only so much of this kind of football fans can take. I can only imagine how angry Max Best is going to be in his half-time team talk. Oh, what’s this? I’m getting a call.

Smakk: We’re recording, mate!

J: Look who it’s from! Max Best is calling!

***

Pascal

We stomped into the dressing room and had the usual cooling-off period.

I sat with my head in my hands wondering who would be playing CAM for Chester next season. Not me. Surely not me.

”Wow,” said Max, walking around. ”That was awful. Haha. You lot are shit. Boo! Boooo! Haha. Sandra, say something positive about that first half.”

She crossed her arms, which was devastating. ”Something positive about that first half? It ended.”

”Haha,” said Max. ”Good one. Okay, well, the good news is that the home fans are fuming and they are mutinous.” He laughed quite hard at that last word. ”That’s the problem with spending tons of money and raising expectations. If you can’t back it up on the pitch, you’ve just made a rod for your own back. As you know, the plan was to play some good football this half but you guys had a better idea. Let’s play fucking shit instead!”

He laughed, which could have been the prelude to an epic meltdown, but he seemed to be genuinely amused.

”The good news is, you’ve contributed to 45 minutes of football that served as a kind of montage for every other game played here this season. What do they call it, a clip show? We’re gonna keep playing like that in the second half because it’s going to really wind the home fans up. I’ve called J from the Chester podcast and he’s going to launch into a chant of ’Sideways and Backwards’ and that will sweep around the stadium. It’s the last home game of the season for Brum and if they keep doing what they’re doing, they’re going to get booed off and there might be protests outside. We could be cooped up in here for hours while the police beg the fans to disperse. Lol. It’s gonna be sensational.”

I found myself speaking. ”You want us to play shit again?”

”Yes, please!”

My mind was regularly blown at Chester, but this was one of the most amazing examples. Our manager wanted us to play badly! ”But... then what?”

Max gave me a strange look, went to Livia’s medical bag, and rummaged around. He found a digital thermometer, turned it on, and walked over so that he could place it close to my forehead. ”Six hundred and ninety-three degrees,” he said, looking at the readout.

”That’s upside down,” said Livia.

”Oh.” Max turned the device around. ”Thirty-six point nine. What’s the safe operating range for a human?”

”He’s healthy,” said Livia.

Max stopped being silly and gave me a longer look. ”You all right? You normally understand my schemes instantly.”

”I’m... not playing well.”

His laugh was deafening. ”You don’t say!” He bent and gave me a shake. ”Shake it off. Shit first half, shake it off. You’re allowed a meltdown once a season, lads, especially when your floating megabrain of a manager one, thinks it’s funny, and two, can use it to mentally disintegrate the oppo. This happens. Normally it’s from fatigue, isn’t it, but you’ve all been rotated. Sometimes it’s shit tactics, players out of position, but this is our default tactic and the default is mint. No, it’s just a bog-standard inexplicable meltdown. It’s no biggie.”

”No biggie?” said Zach.

”No biggie.” Max strolled around, smiling to himself. He let out one laugh, then rubbed his mouth hard, a sure sign that he was about to talk a load of shit. He held up a finger. ”My favourite TV show is The Wire. It’s about people who triumph over adversity, then conspire to bring even more adversity down on top of themselves. At the end, there’s a montage with loads of scenes from the show but with new faces. It’s about how history repeats and nothing ever gets better. Well, guess what? That isn’t my story. That isn’t your story. We ascend. We rise. We get better. We win the second half.”

”Yeah!” shouted Owen Elmham.

”Here’s the plan. We play shit until the home fans can’t bear it any more. Our fans are going to crank up the tension. Someone is going to crack, either Brum’s manager or their players. I think it will be the players. They’ll go insane and try to play like 1970 Brazil, and when they do, bosh. We score. It’s going to be wild in the stadium when that happens, lads. You think your legs are heavy and you can’t run? Imagine you’re fleeing from 20,000 mutinous Brummies! Your legs will fucking work then!” He laughed some more, and the most amazing thing happened - the mental image cured me. I shot up from the bench, squatted, jumped. Energy! I was bursting with energy. Max was enjoying himself. ”Pascal, come here.” While the whole squad laughed, he took my temperature again, and declared it to be ”Six hundred and ninety-three degrees.”

I jabbed him in the chest. ”We get better. We don’t make the same mistake twice. We don’t use the same team talk two weekends in a row!”

Max eyed Peter Bauer, who stood, clenched his fist, and yelled, ”We win the second half!”

Max grabbed Peter’s fist and looked around. He raised a finger. ”After playing shit for a while, remember! Wait until they crack!”

***

Seals Live

Boggy: Birmingham with the ball. They play up the sides of the pitch, find their path blocked, retreat. Across the pitch it goes. Chester making no effort to put the ball carriers under pressure. Don’t they realise we need to win?

Robin: They have been better so far this half, don’t you think?

Boggy: Yes, there’s more energy, but to what end?

Robin: The home fans are getting restless.

Boggy: Huge numbers haven’t returned from the concourses yet. No hurry to finish your pint when the football is this dreadful. I would have expected some tactical changes at half time, but it’s more of the same. Dreadful, dreadful stuff.

Robin: Oh, boy. The Chester fans are singing Sideways and Backwards.

Boggy: There’s quite a jolly feel to it, isn’t there?

Robin: The home fans are joining in. Oh, this is loud!

Boggy: Birmingham still with the ball. Gabriel puts on a little pressure, so the defender gives it back to his goalie. [He pauses, for the boos are defeaning.] My word. The Brummies do not like that.

Robin: The TV cameras are doing lots of close-ups of their manager. He’s under pressure. This could be his last home game. I can’t believe he won’t change anything. Um… no. He pointed and started to shout but didn’t finish.

Boggy: Another pass to the goalie, more boos.

Robin: Chants of ’you’re not fit to wear the shirt!’ Ouch.

Boggy: The away end is laying it on thick. ‘You’re getting sacked in the morning.’

Robin: The home fans are joining in. Haha, the football is awful but the atmosphere is electric.

Boggy: I’m genuinely worried that the next backpass will trigger a riot. The ball’s with Gordon, a centre-back. Gabby moves to cut off a pass to the right. Wibbers and Pascal are closing down forward passing lanes. There’s an easy ball back to the goalkeeper. Please don’t pass back, please don’t pass back.

Robin: Hallelujah!

Boggy: Gordon dribbles forward! He goes past Gabby, past Wibbers. Now what? Oh, he’s tackled! Pascal zoomed up from his blindside, tackled, and hooked the ball to Gabby. The Brazilian purrs forward, and there’s space! Gordon is out of position. Gabby is attacking the penalty area... Is he going to shoot or try to pass to Wibbers? There’s one centre back trying to cover both possibilities. Gabby slows, turns and passes - no! He has taken the defender out with that fake, but he needs to hurry because Gordon is nearly back. Gabby approaches the goalkeeper... and dinks the ball over him!

Robin: [Screams.]

Boggy: Chester are ahead! Chester have done it! The players run around like headless chickens! Gabby doesn’t know where to run. He chooses the fans. They are buoyant. They are bouncing. They are a sea of limbs. Gabby breaks away from the celebrations to cross the pitch to the dugouts. He lifts one of the coaches and spins her around.

Robin: It’s Luisa. She has been giving him extra training.

Boggy: That’s his first goal since February 12th, and what an important goal it could prove to be!

Robin: More close-ups on Birmingham’s manager. He looks like a man who knows the owner will be waiting for him in the dressing room at full time.

Boggy: Why wait? Get rid of him now, I say.

Robin: Boggy!

Boggy: It’s not how football should be played!

***

Pascal

This is how football should be played!

The goal was liberating. Max went full floating megabrain. Wibbers went full Wibbers. Magnus went here, there, and everywhere.

It was hard to keep track of our tactical changes, but there were periods where Magnus played as an inverted fullback and where I played ahead of Lewis on the left wing. Such moments were fleeting but exciting. Even though our formation must have looked lop-sided, to me there was a soundness to what we were doing, even if we were balanced on a diagonal axis. Max often joked about playing 4D chess, but this felt like a step in that direction. I had a spring in my step as I imagined him bellowing, ”I have ascended!”

We drifted into 4-2-2-2, then into Bestball and out into a solid 4-4-2 before easing back into 3-4-2-1.

Our movement, our zest, was too much for Birmingham. We still did not play to our usual standards. Passes were overhit, underhit, and some of our finishing was laughable.

But we carved them open for the second goal, finished by Cheb from short range after a long series of passes.

Then Max surprised me by bringing himself on to replace Joel Reid, and by playing central midfield to a sublime standard. He was the fastest player on the pitch, hit all his passes, did outrageous pieces of skill. The more he combined with us, the more our levels rose.

No, this is how football should be played!

One sizzling move ended with Max evading one tackle, laughing as he summoned another, then clipping a ball around the defence for Lewis to run onto. Lewis took a touch, found the bottom corner, easy as you like, and wheeled away in celebration. I hadn’t known Lewis was there but later, when I rewatched the match, I noted that Max had been moving him around the left touchline ever since he took to the pitch, waiting for the perfect moment to surprise the home team.

Driven forward by Max, we pressed, we probed, we threw bodies into the box, but not recklessly. Youngster always patrolled behind us, often slipping into his preferred DM slot.

Max was clearly thinking about our goal difference, which could determine our final position in the table, but Birmingham’s players dug in to avoid being completely humiliated and we couldn’t find a fourth goal.

In the last minute, we moved to five at the back, and while Max denied it later, I believe it was so that we could play dull horseshoe passing from one side of the pitch to the other while our fans gleefully belted out the Sideways and Backwards song in an almost deserted St. Andrew’s.

***

Deva Station

J: Max Best’s blue-and-white army!

Smakk: Max Best’s blue-and-white army!

J: Max Best’s blue-and-white army!

Smakk: Max Best’s blue-and-white army!

[They pause. There’s a shrill whistle.]

Both: [Into a very shaky camera.] Yeaaaaaahhhhhh!

***

Seals Live

Boggy: And it’s all over! Birmingham City nil, Chester three! Three points for the away team. We return to 5th spot. Five games in seven days turns to four in six. Still so much work to do, but what a start! Robin, final thoughts?

Robin: I loved the goals, the result, and Max’s cameo. But I don’t think this is a match I’ll ever rewatch. Do you?

Boggy: [Laughing.] Not a chance. Let’s hope there is more entertainment tomorrow morning, when our women play their final league match of the season, which we hope will be their final match in the second tier.

Robin: It’s an astonishing thing you’ve just said. It’s unreal.

***

Pascal

Birmingham’s manager was sacked that night. Chalk up another body to the Chester gang.

On Sealbiscuit, when the news broke, I went to Max and suggested this was a victory in his war against shit football.

He gave me a level look. ”You can’t call this a war.”

”Why not?” I asked.

His expression veered between steely determination and weariness. ”Because wars end.”