‘So put it in a Tweet,’ I told him.
‘And stay off Twitter, will you?’ added Dad. ‘You don’t want to put your foot in it again. Leave that to Mario Balotelli.’
In a place like Courchevel, avoiding the press was easy enough but avoiding the comments about me on Twitter was more difficult, especially as with nothing better to do with my time it was becoming something of an addiction.
Seems as if chinks have same problem as white people. They can’t tell one dozy black bastard from another. #Manson’s-fuck-up
That was fairly typical. But some of the comments were actually quite funny.
Confucius say, better the Russian devil you know than the Chinese devil you don’t. #Cityincrisis
What do you call a retarded Chinese football manager? Sum Ting Wong. Or Scott Man Son?
My dad lives very well, it has to be said. His ski chalet is looked after by the local Hotel Kilimandjaro; they supply a chef and other hotel services which means you don’t have to do anything when you’re there. But my dad could see I was becoming restless and one morning, as we walked along to the ski lift, he told me he’d had a call from a friend of his who was on the board at Barcelona FC.
‘Tell me, son, when you were working for Pep Guardiola, did you ever meet a vice-president called Jacint Grangel?’
‘I expect so. But I don’t honestly remember him right now. At Barcelona they’ve got more vice-presidents than Ann Summers.’
‘It seems that he’s got a job for you. It’s not a management or coaching job. It’s something else. Something temporary. But something potentially lucrative. And which he said requires your special skills. His words, not mine.’
‘Like what?’
‘He wouldn’t say on the telephone. But I’ve a shrewd idea of what’s going on. Look, I’ve known Jacint Grangel for thirty years and I can honestly say he’s not a man who would waste your time. Besides, you can speak good Spanish — even a bit of Catalan — so I reckon you can look after yourself down there.’
‘I don’t know, Dad.’
‘You’re wasting your time here, you know that, don’t you? And you can’t hide forever. You fucked up. So what? Football is all about fuck-ups. It’s what makes the game interesting. You fall off the horse, you get back on.’
‘Supposing it’s not a horse you get back on, but a donkey?’
‘Only one way to find out. Get your arse to Barcelona. They’ll pay your expenses. And you’ll get to see the best team in the world play football. I’d come with you myself but you’ll do better on your own. You can make up your mind without your old man there to sway you one way or the other. Don’t want you blaming me for what you end up doing.’
‘Maybe.’
‘Come on. Why not? You always liked it in Barcelona. The women are nice. The food is good. And for some reason they seem to like you. They’re what you have to bear in mind. Not the bastards who hate you. There are people who want you to fail. You have to say “fuck them” and then shit on their heads. You have to rise above yourself, Scott. That’s how success is measured.’
7
The Princesa Sofia Gran Hotel is located in the west of Barcelona and is but a stone’s throw from the famous Camp Nou. It’s not the best hotel in the city — the Princesa has all the charm of a multi-storey car park and I much prefer the art-deco charms of the Casa Fuster nearer the city centre — but it is where FC Barcelona conducts a lot of its commercial business. If you hang around the hotel’s vast, rather Saudi-looking lobby long enough you’re almost certain to see someone famous from the world of Spanish football. From my chilly suite on the eighteenth floor I had a splendid view of Camp Nou which, from this altitude, looked smaller and less impressive than I remembered. It’s only when you’re inside the stadium that you can appreciate how it can accommodate almost a hundred thousand spectators. In 1993 the pitch was lowered by eight feet which helps explain this footballing trompe-l’oeil; and even now there are plans to remodel the stadium and increase capacity by 2021 to 105,000 at a cost of six hundred million euros. Nothing seems to be beyond the ambitions of this club or the Qataris who help to bankroll it. And why not? If you’re ever in Barcelona you should check out the FCB museum; it’s only when you see the trophy cabinet that you can begin to understand where the club’s ambitions are founded.
There’s more than one football club in Barcelona — RCD Espanyol has a large and enthusiastic support, especially among those who are opposed to Catalonian independence — but you wouldn’t know it while you’re there. Almost the whole city wears FCB’s blaugrana colours and everyone you speak to seems to support the club. Virtually the first thing you see as you arrive in the ultra-modern airport terminal is the FC Barcelona shop where, among other club merchandise, you can buy yourself a doll as big as a football boot that resembles your favourite player. In their plastic boxes these have the look of illustrious, embalmed corpses. The Luis Suarez doll is especially like a cadaver from a Mexican catacomb, while Lionel Messi’s figure wears a rictus smile as if he’s not quite sure if his lawyers were serious or not when they told him how much previously avoided tax he now has to pay on undeclared income.
‘They want me to pay how much? You’re joking, surely? Did you really say fifty-two million euros?’
‘Er, yes.’
By all accounts, that’s not the end of the affair, either. It seems that Messi may have to stand trial, with the possibility of going to prison, which is at least one way that Real Madrid can be absolutely certain of el clásico.
It was a cold Sunday night when I walked out of the hotel down to Camp Nou to see a match against Villarreal. I caught a quick glimpse of some of the players arriving in the black cars given to them by club sponsors Audi, whose four-ringed logo is in prominent evidence at the entrance to the club with the result that any match at Camp Nou has the air of a cut-price Olympiad. Still, to my mind these Audis look better to the paying public than Lamborghinis and Bugatti Veyrons. Black means business and a German saloon or Q7 exudes an air of common sense which is sorely lacking in the luxury car showrooms these footballing superstars have at home. And there’s one other good thing about driving a more modest car like an Audi: it’s less likely to arouse the envy and spite of the Spanish tax authorities.
I had a ticket in the central grandstand which entitled me to as much free cuttlefish and Cava as I could eat and drink in the hospitality suite. At €114 a seat there were plenty of locals doing just that, although I could see little or no evidence that any of this hospitality extended to anyone wearing the yellow of Villarreal. I’m not even sure any of them were in the stadium, and certainly no one expected them even to score a goal up against the sheer firepower of Messi, Suarez and Neymar — no one except me, perhaps. Villarreal has a good record against FCB and hadn’t lost a match since November. I necked a quick San Miguel and, keen to avoid the eye of anyone who might remember me from my time at Camp Nou, I went to take my seat.
The minute I felt the glare of the green, heard the buzz of the crowd and caught the smell of the newly sprinkled grass in my nostrils I felt my stomach tighten as if I had been putting on the shirt myself. It’s always like this. I expect there will come a time when I feel different near a football pitch but hopefully those days are still as far off as my Zimmer frame and hearing aid.
My seat was almost on the touchline and very close to the dugout of the FCB técnico Luis Enrique Martínez Garcia. At this level the pitch at the Nou seemed vast and with this number of people cheering on their team it was almost laughable that anything the manager might say during the course of the match would ever be heard by anyone other than the fourth official or the other manager. Really it’s just for the benefit of the fans, or the TV cameras; when you see José Mourinho performing in his technical area think Laurence Olivier in Richard III; and certainly his theatrics are sometimes worthy of an Oscar or a Golden Globe. In spite of the fact that he looks a bit like Roy Keane, I like and admire Luis Enrique who’s probably the fittest guy in football management having competed in several marathons and ironman challenges. And not just me: back in 2004, Pelé named him as one of the top living footballers.