Harry cared not a jot that his candour had retrospectively devalued Merson’s marriage and blithely ignored his former charge’s appealing looks. ‘Anyway I give him the time off then I got a phone call from a mate, saying “I’m in Barbados, I’ve just seen Paul Merson on the beach.” I goes “No. Merson’s in Tony Adams’s clinic” – turns out he was lying but he came back the next week and scored twice.’
The upbeat ending of the yarn was somewhat lost on Merson as he was now just staring blankly into camera having been off-handedly outed as a philanderer in a story meant to illustrate his wayward talent.
Some say Redknapp deserves a big stage on which to display his under-appreciated skill. But he is adored at Pompey and will be forever loved in East London and, whilst Newcastle are a fantastic club with incredible supporters, I don’t think their administrators deserve a great manager like Harry.
23
If Keegan’s a messiah I want the Cockney Moses
The Dionysian versus the Apollonian, romanticism versus pragmatism, forever we oscillate and vie between these two contrasting ideas. A wise man once remarked to me that the Third Reich was an example of what happens when you put an artist in a position of power; although many of Hitler’s atrocities were committed as a result of him being a right bastard as opposed to an artist – there’s nothing in pointillism that suggests that genocide would be worthwhile.
I suppose what he was saying was that a personality whose mind is governed by poetic ideas like Bavarian myth and the operas of Wagner oughtn’t be put in charge of foreign policy and defence because they’ll pursue impractical objectives to achieve, in this case misguided, romantic ends.
Kevin Keegan’s reappointment as Geordie messiah made me reflect on this theory. Now, I’m right behind any second coming, it appeals to me, a Geordie messiah, why stop there? Let’s have Harry Redknapp as a Cockney Moses and Martin O’Neill as an Ulster Herod. I am enthralled by narrative and Keegan’s return is a great story; he’s an intriguing character who, I gather, is a little embittered about the way he’s been handled by the English press and feels he has scores to settle.
I was initially baffled when I heard the news but on reflection it makes perfect sense particularly if regarded as an insular romance between the people of Newcastle and Keegan rather than a managerial decision made by a massive franchise. Because logically, surely, this doesn’t add up. When Keegan took Toon on its euphoric romp from the foot of Division One to the summit of the Premier League the footballing landscape was very different. Newcastle were loaded and had few rivals in terms of spending power; that, coupled with Kev’s then-untarnished ebullience, was sufficient to bring them tantalisingly close to glory.
‘Perhaps it’s not for us to understand the Geordies and their rose-tinted fetish of the miner’s son’
But if you look at the top flight now can one really envisage Keegan outsmarting teams bossed by David Moyes, Juande Ramos, Mark Hughes, not to mention the big four and Cockney Moses and Ulster Herod? I suppose when you’re in love such things cease to be relevant.
‘He’s got a suspect temperament.’ ‘Oh I know but look at his hair.’ ‘He struggles tactically with defence.’ ‘Yeah, but when he looks into my eyes I feel like I’m the only person on earth.’ ‘He makes emotional decisions then walks away when he feels the heat.’ ‘Look, just fuck off will you, I love him.’
For Newcastle fans those fêted few seasons under Keegan still have the power of transcendental love, an idyllic holiday away from the glum drudgery of under-achievement and of course they will once more be guaranteed cavalier, adventurous football – he is the anti-Allardyce.
Perhaps it’s not for us to try to understand the Geordies and their rose-tinted fetish of the admittedly adorable miner’s son – few outside of east London will appreciate the adulation felt for ‘vicious-looking’ Julian Dicks, and Robbie Fowler could probably push an old lady in a wheelchair into the Mersey without relinquishing his status as ‘God’.
In a sport increasingly compromised for capitalist ends perhaps we should celebrate this tiny triumph of the heart over the head, while Liverpool’s beloved Rafael Benítez looks like he’s about to be ‘Jolled’ good and proper by a board that clearly don’t respect the feelings of the Kop. The Toon army is being heard.
To me it seems that Keegan can but fail, but what the bloody hell do I know, I’m no expert and I don’t support Newcastle but as a fan of football and romance I should be cock-a-hoop at this recalcitrant disregard for reason.
Perhaps Alan Shearer will join as his no. 2; they could commence each home match with a Women in Love-style nude wrestle in the centre circle while Michael Owen blows cocaine into their anuses. Why not? It’ll be a bonding experience like no other.
Keegan’s appointment is romantic rather than pragmatic but does that make it wrong? I suppose the correct answer is ‘who cares?’ It’s made thousands of people incredibly happy and unless he’s had a massive change in philosophical direction in the interim period the consequences are unlikely to be as horrifically profound as Hitler’s elevation. Just to be clear: Keegan good, Hitler bad.
24
Is Morrissey talking the language of West Ham?
Is it insanely narcissistic for me to contemplate that Morrissey is trying to communicate with me through the wearing of replica West Ham tops? The answer is, of course, ‘Yes’. ‘Yes it is. Why would you even need to ask?’ Well, because I’ve been courting Morrissey, of whom I’m a lifelong fan (if that life is about 18 years), for several months with the intention of persuading him to commit to a documentary where I interview him, follow him about and analyse his legacy.
‘I became rigid with dashed expectation as I awaited my name like it was the sixth Lotto Thunderball number’
He is aware of my devotion to the Hammers and seems rather fond of me; recently on stage at a handful of gigs that I was unfortunately unable to attend he introduced the members of his band before saying ‘and I’m Russell Brand’. When I heard tell of this I became all queasy and loopy and reckoned it to be the start of a beautiful friendship with a beloved icon. The knowledge of this name-check dramatically impaired my enjoyment of the performance I attended at the Camden Roundhouse this week (‘I don’t perform, seals perform…unfortunately’) as between each song I became rigid with dashed expectation as I awaited the utterance of my name like it was the sixth Lotto Thunderball number. The trepidation was so torturously unbearable that I nearly leapt to my feet and screeched: ‘I’m Russell and I need you to love me.’
Thankfully I just sat there all spurned, listening to the hardcore chant, to the tune of ‘’Ere We Go’, ‘Morrissey, Morrissey, Morrissey’. I once did a gig with Noel Gallagher and the similarity between the crowd there and at football was startling but I suppose somehow natural because of the obvious corollary of those two demographics, but would you expect to find a large terrace fraternity at a Morrissey gig?
I suppose I’m an unlikely member of both groups; alas on that occasion, unlike at Upton Park, I was unwilling to subjugate my identity into the throng but instead perched on my seat’s edge wringing my clammy fists like a meekly loyal housekeeper waiting to be listed in the Oscar acceptance speech of an oblivious employer.
At the point in his set where he introduced his band I became so agitated with futile hope that I kicked over my neighbour’s drink and locked hands with my companion so tightly that to escape she had to chew through her own wrist like a trapped fox. The fantastic set concluded, quite rightly, without any mention of my name, which has helped me to reevaluate my expectations of live entertainment. I won’t on Wednesday, for Liverpool’s visit to West Ham, expect Dean Ashton and Mark Noble to come out at half-time and sing ‘To All The Girls I’ve Loved Before’ without once breaking eye contact with me, and I think that alone will make it a more enjoyable evening.
So, with my unrealistic, egocentric dementia happily acknowledged we can return to the question posed at this article’s genesis. On th
e cover of his new single ‘That’s How People Grow Up’ Morrissey is wearing a West Ham Boys’ Club T-shirt – now he did once wear the same shirt nine years ago, before we met, before he would’ve had any awareness of my existence, unless he was a secret attendant of Grays School’s production of Bugsy Malone in which I dazzled as Fat Sam, but is there even the remotest possibility that his renewed interest in the garment could’ve been sparked by my own allegiance to the club? ‘No, let it go.’ Well, after the show I asked him. Not outright like Paxman, more opaque and obtuse, like Columbo.
I had him cornered but not isolated; also present were the former QPR striker, now with MK Dons, Kevin Gallen and a bloke called Liam, who I think was a Millwall fan. I cagily asked Morrissey why he had taken to wearing the claret and blue, fingers crossed in pockets that the response would come ‘Because of you, darling boy’ but before Morrissey spoke Kevin said to him, ‘You’re a QPR fan ain’t ya?’ and Liam said, ‘I thought you liked Millwall?’
I saw this as a brilliant opportunity to recount an intriguing anecdote I once heard on the History Channel, told by an old German man who had once been a member of the Hitler Youth. (I know this is the second consecutive week that I’ve mentioned Hitler, I’m not secretly Nazi, I don’t know why it keeps happening, I think he was a wicked, wicked man. Wicked as in bad, not hip and edgy.)
It was along the lines of: ‘We the assembled ranks of the Hitler Youth were watching the Führer give a speech, and at the point he said “You young men are the future of the Fatherland” he looked right into my eyes and I knew he was speaking specifically to me. When I told the other members of my experience each of them said “No, when he said that he looked into my eyes.”’
Now I related this to demonstrate amusingly that all three of us had keenly believed that Morrissey was a follower of our chosen team but midway through I remembered NME coating him off and calling him racist.
To be clear Morrissey is not racist, and only a twit could make such an accusation. None the less I thought ‘Oh no, he’s gonna think I’m comparing him to Hitler’ – I mean he’s a vegetarian, artistic and very charismatic but it’s not a comparison I imagine he’d welcome. I began to flounder and back-pedal, trying to distance myself from my words even as they tumbled from my mouth, clarifying and mitigating like a drowning Hugh Grant. When I finished blathering Morrissey gave a world-weary sigh and turned to the other two gents – ‘Of course…this is what Russell does for a living’ he said.
25
Well done stern Fabio for defying our emotions
Sentiment is adjudged by some ‘the unearned emotion’ – to mawkishly coo about some cute tot or bumbling pensioner whilst not having to wipe their bottoms or tolerate their gurgling. Hemingway said of his father: ‘He was a sentimental man and like most sentimental people he was also very cruel.’
This I understand as the slick transition between snuggling up to an adorable kitten, stroking its fluffy bonce, going ‘Aaah. Aaaah. AaaaAaAaaah’ till eventually you love it so much that only crushing its skull and feasting on its gooey brains will be a sufficient expression of that feeling. I used to cuddle my dog Topsy too hard and sometimes I want to kiss babies with such vigour that my childless status is a blessing to infanticide statistics.
Fabio Capello is neither sentimental nor cruel; he is, on the evidence of his decision not to select David Beckham, and his trophy-spangled CV, a football manager making choices informed by football realities.
Dear old Steve McClaren was like a beige moth flitted about on the farts and grunts of public opinion and media flatulence: ‘You don’t want Beckham? He’s gone. No Paul Robinson you say? He’s history. You want Beckham back? One moment, I’ll pop off and get him.’ I think we, as a nation, could’ve tricked him into fielding a team of players’ wives in their bras, which I’d’ve been well into, especially now Cheryl Cole is on the rebound – she may’ve gone crackers during a goal celebration and leapt into the crowd like a cross between Cantona and Caligula and noshed off them twerps in that brass band.
‘99 is an ice cream with a Flake in it. Delicious. What’s 100? Just a lousy letter from the Queen’
Capello will not allow his squad to become emotional pornography where we squint and jostle through Beckham’s century, teary eyed by the achievement of a goal that is in fact abstract. I believe it was Lee and Herring that pointed out that the only reason we fetishise the number 10 is because we have 10 fingers and if we inhabited a planet of Dave Allens, where everyone had nine and a half fingers, we’d all be salivating at the prospect of Beckham achieving 95 caps, which he’s already done.
Although Capello has stressed that the door remains open to Beckham so he may yet acquire the cosmically meaningless accolade of 100 caps, I think he ought be contented with 99. Nine, I seem to remember from my poxy school days, is a magic number, doing all sorts of arithme-tricks and 99 is a type of ice cream with a Flake in it. Delicious. What’s 100? Just a lousy letter from the Queen, which I imagine is standardised and just says something like: ‘Well done for not dying, love the Queen.’ I’d rather have a Flake.
The general consensus throughout the media seems to be that Capello has made the right decision, many applauding his bravery and urging him to go further by axing Michael Owen. Wouldn’t it be even braver to immediately implement my excellent footballers’ wives scheme where on Wednesday we’d see a flock of gorgeous harpies tottering out onto the hallowed turf? Plus I’m going to the Switzerland match and I might get myself a kazoo and sit with them oompah pah pah nerds and wait for Cheryl to go nuts.
Hey, I’m not making light of their situation, Ashley is a silly sausage but we all make mistakes – having a wife that beautiful might eventually make you go a bit stir crazy, like being chained to a Canaletto, he probably needed to break out and leer over a Rolf Harris as a kind of sorbet to rinse away the relentless glory of his wife’s fizzog.
Some seem agitated that Capello’s squad held few surprises, well he does have to pick from the rather limited genre of English footballers so there was always going to be an air of predictability about it. He can’t say, ‘Up front is King Herod partnering Ray Winstone and in goal is Taylor Coleridge’s The Ancient Mariner. Oh no – that’s a disaster, he only stoppeth one in three.’
I’ve seen Capello’s Hasselhoff-Grandma face at every football match I’ve watched on telly so he must have a fair idea of what’s going on and I think he’s got the right blend of experienced players and Aston Villa treasures. I’d like to have seen caps for Dean Ashton and Robert Green and maybe even Mark Noble but at least I don’t have to spend the next few days worrying that they’ll have their legs smashed in by England’s reckless training methods.
What do they do there? Cage-fighting? I think it’s an auspicious start for Fabio; perhaps Beckham will win his ultimately pointless century in a competitive game and we can all have a saucy emo-toss over something that matters.
26
Let’s revolt against Lucre-more’s ludicracy
I’m in Antigua in the Caribbean inhaling limitless beauty and enjoying the unstudied benevolence of the people who live here. Fred, a friendly bloke who works at the hotel and laughs at me or with me – I hope it’s the latter, it doesn’t do to be presumptuous – took me and my young consort to watch the Caribbean Twenty20 cricket tournament currently in full swing on the island. Cricket is obviously very popular here and this new variation on the formula has taken the West Indies by storm.
I don’t know much about cricket; my knowledge was mostly gleaned from a BBC drama called Bodyline, which recounted the Douglas Jardine versus Donald Bradman Ashes series, which must’ve been in the early 30s. Good it was. The trick was to throw the ball at the batsman instead of the wicket, which really spiced things up and I think it ought be reinstated nowadays or perhaps bowlers should be given pistols and shoot batsmen as soon as the match starts making the game even shorter, which I think would be a blessing.
‘They want to make as much money
as possible whilst not actually appearing to be living incarnations of Satan’
The other thing I know about cricket is from them adverts where Ian Botham and Allan Lamb advertise chops because both their names have ‘meat’ connotations – Beefy Botham and, well, lamb. The whole silly business made my vegetarianism seem all the more brilliant. The two of ‘em scoffing down lumps of flesh, fat and rind between their gnashers going all rancid made me think meat is not only murder – it’s also halitosis.
This Twenty20 caper was a pleasant enough evening mostly because of the jubilant carnival conducted throughout the match (Dominica versus Barbados) – often the celebrations were entirely divorced from the on-pitch action. I saw one group of women gleefully gyrate and high-five when Barbados got ‘a four’ and then repeat the ecstatic ritual when the same batsman was bowled out minutes later.
This tournament was devised by a Texan businessman who himself had little knowledge of cricket. He owns the stadium and the TV rights as well as having a lot of other commercial interests on the island. Clearly this man had motivations outside of altruism, business people always do. It’s how they define themselves – ‘Hello, I’m a businessman.’ They say.
This globe-trotting soccer circus proposed by Richard Scudamore (I’m suggesting Lucre-more, if anyone wants it, they must credit me) damned by Harry Redknapp as ‘unnatural’ and Gareth Southgate as an ‘April fool’ is another decision by the Premier League that does not have the interest of fans at heart. This is not surprising though is it? They are, once more, business people. They want to make as much money as possible whilst not actually appearing to be living incarnations of Satan. It must be a constant exercise in brinkmanship.
Articles of Faith Page 9