6.

  Saturday, January 31 - Transfer Deadline Day

  Hot water blasted onto my face before fading away to a weak dribble. Mansfield Town's Field Mill stadium is said to be the oldest in the football league, with the first verified match taking place there in 1861. The showers in the away dressing room were relatively new and like most new things they had intentionally been made shit. At waist height was a button. I pressed it and hot water blasted onto my face for eight seconds until the flow ceased.

  I decided that I would press the button every five seconds. That would guarantee a constant flow, right?

  Wrong.

  The person whose job it was to stop me enjoying my shower was a genius, a true floating megabrain. Not only did the shower reject any input made while it was dispensing water, it also ignored anything from the three seconds after it had done its work. I snarled and slammed the button again. I wasn't going to take this shit from anyone, let alone a bathroom fixture.

  All around the shower block were exasperated players. Magnus was using this ordeal as a way to practise mindfulness. Banksy was mechanically pressing the button once every fifteen seconds or so. Henri was becoming enraged. "You will not break me!" he snapped, reaching out to throttle the pipe.

  I hit the button, counted, and got to seven before the flow stopped. I did it again and counted to eight. Then eight, then seven. They had programmed the showers to dispense variable rewards! These Mansfield fuckers were really playing dirty pool with us. Mental disintegration 20.

  In the unit next to me, Lee Hudson yelled, "Fuck this!" and stormed off. Dan Badford rushed to take the space. He looked at me, opened his mouth, thought better of it, and turned away.

  "What?" I said.

  "Nothing."

  Ever since the United game, Dan's Morale had been going crazy, fluctuating from abysmal to superb like a seismograph placed on top of a drunk penguin in a shopping trolley. I had been waiting for a clue about what was causing his mood swings but with no luck. I mean, the obvious thing was that a big club was tapping him up and he wanted to leave. I mashed the cursed button. "Out with it," I said to both the shower and Dan.

  "Don't you have to talk to the media?"

  "Peter's doing it," I said. "For the last time," I added, darkly.

  He looked shifty. "Okay, ah... Look, can I talk to you on Sealbiscuit? Bit of a chinwag, as my mum calls it."

  "It's transfer deadline day and I'm a football manager with half a million quid burning a hole in his pocket. Today's a terrible day to wag chins."

  He didn't seem put out and his Morale didn't drop. "Sorry, that was stupid of me. It can wait."

  Okay, so he wasn't asking for a transfer. He wasn't planning to R. Brown me. "Dan," I said, but he pushed his shower button and as the water streamed onto him, he couldn't hear me.

  As I wondered what he wanted, something mad happened - the water kept flowing. I looked from the showerhead to Dan's hand and - eureka! I pressed my button and held it. The water hit me and kept hitting me. I almost did a jig. The system was bonkers and aggressively anti-user, but right then and there I cared not.

  I lathered my hair and rubbed myself with various masculine unguents and held the button in once more.

  Bliss!

  When Dan finished I said, "Sealbiscuit. You and me. Big chat. Yeah? Good. Better tell Henri how to use the shower before he does one of those spontaneous human combustion things."

  ***

  I got dressed and asked Magnus to escort me to Sealbiscuit. Once I was in my spot I closed my eyes and tried to calm down. There was a storm in my head to match the one outside but I needed to find some semblance of peace in order to make good decisions.

  One thing that often calmed me down was checking how many experience points I had.

  XP balance: 7,054

  The Man United game had been an XP bonanza - I'd earned close to 1,400 - and the Mansfield match we had just played was lucrative, too. It had kicked off late because of the travel chaos caused by Storm Dolly. The high winds, air pressure, the stress of the day and the tension of the match - if they could beat us, Mansfield had a genuine shot at winning the title - had contributed to a medical emergency in the crowd. The match was paused for well over twenty minutes and in that time I was still awarded XP.

  The thought led to some obvious conclusions - why not fake a medical emergency at every home match? I could increase my XP income by an easy twenty or thirty percent. I dismissed the idea because it was one, sociopathic, and two, was sure to trigger a visit from Old Nick. I hadn't seen him or the imps for ages and I was absolutely fine with that.

  Seven thousand XP. That was enough to buy the Interested Parties perk, which would tell me which clubs were interested in my players. That was a good one to have in place in time for summer but didn't strike me as being the sort of thing you bought in the last few hours of a transfer window.

  Attributes 10 was four thousand and 3-4-2-1 was going for five thousand. Both quite desirable but they could wait until I'd seen the February perk offer.

  I was much more interested in continuing to buy the cheap perks to remove them from the perk shop. For 300 XP, Manager Stats would put ever more data in my head, while for 500 the average ratings field would get filled in. Player Comparison would let me put two player profiles on the same screen. Not much value for the 630 cost.

  1500 would allow me to start upgrading Playdar and while I was using that talent quite heavily and to great effect, I was wary of spending all my Man United income to unlock a perk tree - in my current mental state I wanted fewer options, not more.

  I was leaning towards buying a couple of cheap ones and then targeting the Panopticon tree. For two thousand XP I could inject additional squads into my brain. I would get their current player profiles from anywhere in the world and be able to check their Morale and injury status. I would probably start with the boys under eighteens but we had big assets in the younger groups, too.

  If I added the under twelves I would be able to check on Steven Watson and the other four triple-digit PA pipsqueaks. If I then bought 'Full Frontal' I would be able to see any deleterious status effects right from the main page. If I then bought Interested Parties I would be able to see which players were being scouted. There wasn't a whole lot I could do to stop Mr. Watson moving his boy to one of the Merseyside clubs if that's what he wanted but I could get the Brig to dig up some dirt on the scout or the academy directors so I could extract a proper fee.

  The Panopticon perk could also be extended to cover Saltney, West, and College.

  Doing all that felt extremely urgent, but so did adding attributes and formations.

  The doors of the bus opened and the lads got on. Dan was at the head of the queue. Keen! His first question didn't put me at ease.

  "Will we be back in time for the deadline? Can we still trade players if you're not there?"

  "Even with the storm and the delays we should be back by nine. Ten at the latest. The deadline goes to eleven and yeah, I don't absolutely need to be there."

  Dan nodded at one of the players who were streaming by. "Isn't it strange that the deadline is a Saturday? I thought they always moved it to the next Monday."

  "There are no whatsits," I said. "Strict rules. Some years they push it back, sometimes they don't. I think no-one could be arsed rearranging it this year because there will be fewer deals with the World Cup coming this summer. Something like that, anyway. I'm happy if it's always the 31st of Jan. I don't have much of a voice yet but when I'm king of the world we will pick a date and stick to it so everyone knows where they stand. The January transfer window can't end on the third of February, for fuck's sake."

  Foquita was next in the line. He tried to speak to me. "Mister," he said.

  "Get fucked," I suggested, jabbing my thumb to the back of the bus.

  Foquita tried to use his sad puppy eyes on me. "Se?or," he said.

  "Fuck off, sit down, shut up, stay shutted up."

  Foquita sighed. Pascal was behind him and gave him a nudge. They shuffled along the aisle.

  Dan said, "How did you learn to be such a good man manager?" He saw that I wasn't in the mood. "Sorry, that was... I'm joking. Bad joke. Sorry."

  "It's all right," I said. "It was funny. Maybe don't provoke me today, though."

  "No."

  "Unless you're trying to engineer a move away from the club." No reaction. I rubbed my eyebrows. "Fuck, I didn't even turn my phone on."

  Dan watched as I fished it out and held the power button down. "You still turn it off to save battery? But..."

  "But it's the new model with good battery life and we can charge it on Sealbiscuit. I know." I rubbed my eyebrows again. "It's habit now. I think turning it off is good for me. Turns every match into a digital detox. I shouldn't be wondering who Chip is trying to buy when I'm trying to work out how to play tiki-taka in a fucking tornado." I punched the plastic tray built into the seat in front of me.

  Dan's eyes widened slightly. "The digital detox is doing wonders for your mindfulness."

  I held my hand up and checked for wounds. "Wit that sharp cuts both ways."

  He shook his head. "I know. I couldn't help it. The joke was right there. Couldn't stop my mouth."

  "I know the feeling."

  "I thought Folke Wester was doing the transfers at Bradford."

  "He might be choosing them but it's Chip doing the actual deals."

  "I reckon it will be Folke."

  I scoffed. "Thanks for the great insight into how the world works, mate. It's Chip and I know that for a fact. He's striding around his yacht or he's in the back of the Chip Van making calls, making promises, making the world go round. TJ, my mate from Crawley, has a source who's on the other side of one of the deals; the club and agent are absolutely pulling Chip's pants down. He's trying to sign three players and the three clubs and agents are colluding to drive the fees up and get better conditions."

  "How?"

  "They've agreed to string him along but not sign anything until the hour before the deadline. The best thing he could do right now is what I would do - cancel the deals, walk away, move onto your second targets. The agents would get back on the phone in minutes, nice and reasonable. Chip's not going to do that. He thinks he's a master of business and can get the better of the sharks and old hands he's dealing with. Here, let's see what's what."

  I had a flurry of messages, mostly from agents offering me players. Some were from other managers and directors of football. I showed one to Dan.

  Coventry City DoF: If you change your mind about Badford, let me know!

  He looked away briefly. "Do you always write clubs instead of names? What if that guy moves?"

  "I get alerts about that sort of thing. I change the names, mate. I don't need help managing my contacts list, thanks. Jesus. What else have we got here? Hold on. Heh heh. Check this one out."

  TJ: Stevenage have told Chip his latest bid doesn't cut it but they've given him permission to speak to the player and get terms agreed 'in case'. Very clever, that. The more Chip negotiates with the player, the more he's invested in the deal, the more he'll fixate on it.

  "Who's that about?"

  "That's Gareth Davies, the striker. He's what... thirty-one? Folke is mad about him and he thinks there's a deal to be had. That's why they appealed Chipper's ban even though there's a risk it gets changed from 4 matches to 5. Chip wasn't convinced by Davies at first but now he's into it because he wants to have two Welsh strikers so he can call them the Double Dragons."

  "Cool name."

  "Of course it's cool, he stole it from me. Davies is the first idea he hasn't stolen from me, so that's a relief. Have you seen Single WhiteFemale? I'm surprised Chip hasn't copied my haircut."

  "Is Davies good?"

  "Very good, yeah. It's like buying Foquita but it'll be, what, six or seven hundred thousand quid? For a guy in decline with no resale value? Folke will say it guarantees promotion and it's a decent argument but as someone working with a tiny budget, the idea makes me wince. Ah, one from everyone's third-favourite lawyer."

  Gemma: I'm still waiting to hear from Weasel. I have kept MD updated.

  "Bad news?" said Dan.

  I closed my eyes and went to the transfer news screen, filtering by Reading.

  January 30 - Ian Swan - Reading - Chester - 200,000

  Nothing since. "Hmm," I said, allowing my lids to open in their own time. "It's just a mess with Duggers. Everything's a mess. Life is a mess."

  "I heard he pissed you off and you flounced out of the meeting."

  "I don't flounce." I flexed my hand, checking the knuckles for cuts. They stung but there was no need for plasters or an ice pack. "All it is, right, is his agent took the piss. Duggers came to me the next day and we had a proper chat. Like, he's enjoying his football at Reading but he isn't getting paid every month and it's obvious the club's in a downward spiral. The manager is a miracle worker but he's in demand and at some point he's going to ask himself why he's working so hard to keep the club going when the owner is working so hard to destroy it. Duggers likes what we're trying to do and okay, in the best possible scenario he wouldn't be taking a pay cut to join us but he's not stupid and he's heard we're in the career rehabilitation business and that's what he needs. I didn't tell him to bin his agent off because I don't need to get sued but he somehow got the impression that would help his career."

  "Boss," chuckled Dan.

  "Apropos of nothing I told him about this new law firm that specialises in sports. Woman in charge is called Gemma, I think."

  "You can't pretend you're not sure when your actual girlfriend works there too."

  "Does she? I'm not one of those overbearing boyfriends, Dan. As long as Emma is happy and healthy she can do what she wants."

  "So Gemma's helping Duggers sack his agent so he can come to Chester?"

  "No. Gemma's helping Duggers sack his agent. What happens next is completely unrelated. As it happens, there is a fair chance we might sign him."

  "I see."

  "Gemma did everything by the book, went through Duggers' contracts and all that. She thinks Weasel - that's the agent - doesn't have a leg to stand on but MD doesn't want to get Chester involved in any disputes. Gemma's trying to get Weasel to sign some document saying he understands he no longer represents Duggers and waives his right to be a whiny little bitch about what happens in the rest of his career."

  "Some of these legal terms are flying over my head."

  "Weasel would get a sweet little pay off, which is more than he's owed. What's going to happen is that Ruth will take Duggers as a client - after a discreet interval - but will he be a Chester player? The odds aren't good right now."

  "He could join in summer."

  I pulled a face. "It's kind of now or never. Today's the last day for all this transfer nonsense to go down and tomorrow a lot of unhappy players are going to wake up and realise they're stuck at shitty clubs for the next five months. Lots of good players have contracts that expire this summer and from tomorrow I'm going to try to sign them up. I like to get my business done early and signing three or four players in February would be pretty fucking early."

  "What about the Phwoar Room?"

  "I've got some reputation now and there are hundreds of players with expiring contracts who would join us. I could get next season's Lee H wrapped up next week. Do you know what I mean? We're evolving. Times change."

  Times change, players leave. Would Dan be at the head of the queue? Was that why I was talking so openly? Some sort of attempt to reel him back in?

  The bus driver checked with Vimsy and Peter and with a satisfying little noise, Sealbiscuit whirred into life. We were on our way home.

  My phone vibrated - I had an incoming video call from Camila. I tutted, sighed, sat up straight, and hit the green icon.

  ***

  "Max," she said, and that beautiful voice of hers calmed me down by about six percent. She was dressed simply and was on a sofa next to Foquita's mother, who was fussing with her jewellery. "What is happening? Foquita is very unhappy. You shouted at him and replaced him and he doesn't know why."

  I thought about making a joke but didn't have the energy. I nodded my head back towards the stadium. "We just played Mansfield. It's a town in Nottinghamshire. They're second in the league, really good team." They had an average CA of 89. My eleven had 85. "There's a storm and it's crazy windy. We have a young player in goal and he conceded two goals that looked easy but honestly I don't know if anyone would have saved them. It's an impossible job being a goalkeeper in such conditions. When the second goal went in, Foquita showed how unhappy he was by throwing his arms around, gesticulating, yelling."

  "He should be happy when his teammates make a mistake?"

  "No, he should be pissed but he should understand the context and he should never, ever, throw a fucking tantrum about one of my players but especially not one of my young players. If he's not happy with his teammates he needs to direct his anger at me and never, ever at them. It's my job to get a squad together, my job to pick the team. If Foquita wants to shout at someone he can come to me, not a seventeen-year-old. It's not Banksy's fault he's in the team, is it?"

  "I see."

  "I don't like Foquita's vibe today. He's scored a few goals and he thinks he's better than us, too good for Chester, too good to be playing alongside young players? Like he's the perfect player already? Well he's fucking not. He made more mistakes than Banksy today but the difference is his mistakes don't lead to oppo goals and no-one throws a tantrum when Foquita can't control a fucking simple ball to feet. My job was to get him in the shop window for his next move and I've done that. If he thinks he can be a prima donna around here he can fuck off. That position is occupied."

  Camila smiled. "Max, let us be calm. I will talk to Foquita and perhaps we can discuss it together."

  "I'm not talking to him until he apologises to Banksy."

  Camila translated for Foquita's mum; she muttered something as she made the sign of the cross. "I will talk to him."

  She hung up.

  "She's lovely," said Dan. "Do you remember that dress?"

  "No," I said. "I don't remember the silver dress she wore at the Christmas party and I definitely don't think about it all the time while watching goalies pump long balls that catch in the wind and they have to fucking save their own clearances."

  "Did you like the art?"

  What a question! I had no clue where Dan was going. "Yeah. It was funny and clever. Henri's mind is an autumnal orchard - but don't eat the fruit."

  Dan's weight moved forward as though he was trying to gee himself up to get to the fucking point. "If we get into Europe and play against Bilbao can we go a day early and visit the Guggenheim?"

  "We would miss a day of training. It's not what serious teams do."

  "So can we?"

  "Yeah, why not?"

  Dan nodded. "Ryan and Jackie were telling me how they've been to loads of places to play football but they couldn't hardly tell you anything about those cities because it was just get in, get out."

  "Have you seen Master and Commander?"

  Dan frowned as he tried to summon a memory of such a film. "No."

  "Watch it with Youngster if you want some relationship points with him. It's about a warship in the olden days. The captain of the ship is best mates with the ship's doctor. The doctor's always nagging him about popping to the Galapagos Islands. The captain's like dude, we're at war! The doctor goes, but you promised! The doctor gets injured and the captain's like fuck this war, I'm keeping my promise to my mate. They rock up to the islands and the doctor gets to motor about looking at frogs or whatever. Suddenly he sees the enemy ship is parked round the corner. He's like man, can't I just sit here and watch this stick insect in peace? He goes back to tell the captain and they do another action set piece."

  Dan processed all that. "You're saying we can go to a museum... unless we can't."

  "Pretty much, yeah. I don't want to be one of those dudes who has been to Rome and never eaten a proper local pizza. But I also don't want to go all that way and lose. I hear," I said, conspiratorially, "they don't even have stuffed crusts there. What the fuck!"

  Dan smiled but just as I thought we were getting closer to the heart of the matter, he showed just what an elusive player he could be. "What did you talk to Pedro Porto about?"

  I regarded Dan, but he didn't seem to be trying to prise sensitive information out of me or anything like that. "I gave him some advice and he was very appreciative."

  Dan laughed way too hard at that. "Okay, if you don't want to talk about it - "

  "There's not much to say. We took his nice wine upstairs and he met Emma and her cousins. Wee Bonnie has met gobby Mancunians before but she has never met a Portuguese superstar. I get some play from women because I'm, like, the conductor of this orchestra." I circled my finger around. "Imagine that times ten in the stadium and times a million on social media and that's the difference in status between me and him."

  "Isn't she, like, fourteen?"

  "Oh, I wasn't talking about Wee Bonnie. Was more thinking about this waitress. I was trying to smoulder at her but Pedro said can I ask you for a screw and she just melted." I laughed. "So unfair. I'm not even sure if he said the wrong word on purpose. Yeah he's just a nice guy and I explained the pressing circle to him. He was absolutely fascinated, said it was one of the craziest things he's ever seen but there was a certain logic to it. I said, 'Shame you don't have the balls to try it for yourself.' He didn't like that."

  Dan got excited. "He did it, though! Against Newcastle!"

  I laughed. "Yeah and it worked. Turner Blindeye had set his players to press the left-sided centre back so Pedro simply moved him into the middle. Newcastle's players rushed him and United played wide. Two-nil up at half time before Turner fixed his mistake."

  "The TV people were calling Porto a genius. I was getting really worked up. It's Max Best who's the genius!"

  I was intrigued by the idea of Dan Badford getting worked up. I'd never seen it. "Good artists copy, great artists steal. I didn't invent the wheel thing - I saw it in one of those YouTube compilations called something like 'The Eight Maddest Moments in Football'. I'll take some credit that I was able to work out what the manager was trying to achieve. And I'll take credit for working out that it's stupid to set a specific player as a pressing trigger if you can't undo it quickly. It's too easy to exploit. I swear these managers only do things because everyone else is doing it."

  "Herd mentality."

  My phone pinged a couple of times in quick succession.

  TJ: The agents of this country have a new nickname for Chip Star.

  Me: Go on, what?

  TJ: Father Chipmas. He's always giving out gifts. His latest negotiation went like this. Player's agent tells his client he's going to ask for five grand a week because they're dropping down a division. Chip's opening offer... six grand a week! Agent has balls of steel because instead of biting Chip's hand off, he's saying yeah not sure there are other clubs interested.

  Me: When agents are mean to me, that's tragedy. When they do it to Chip, that's comedy.

  TJ: I'm running out of popcorn. I love transfer deadline day.

  The next one was an update about Duggers.

  Gemma: Not looking good. I think I should switch my efforts to convincing MD that The Wall will stand between the club and Weasel. What do you think?

  I pulled at my lip for a while. Adding to MD's stress wasn't good for either of us and there was still time to bring a left-footed midfielder on loan. Or I could work around the gap in the squad. Josh Owens hadn't played well at left midfield today, but he was getting better every week.

  Dan said, "I read that Napoleon used to divide a paper in two and write the pros on one side and the cons on another."

  "Are you helping me with my decision-making process?"

  Dan shrugged.

  I pulled a face but discussing decisions usually led to better outcomes. Why not explain it to Dan? "Okay, first thing. Does the squad need a left mid? We have formations that don't use one and we have Pascal, Josh, Magnus, and Wibbers who can play there. And me."

  "You haven't played for ages," said Dan.

  I ignored that. Magnus was dubious about my injury and had asked me not to resume full training. The heel didn't feel quite right but I would get a scan in the coming week and take it from there. "So we don't need need need a left mid but I want one and if we can get him now we can build him up for six months and really attack next season. We're short-ish at centre back but we can manage with what we've got. There are good players with contracts winding down this summer. Why pay a fee now when I can get them for free if I wait? Long story short, I want a left-mid but I'm not desperate. The benefit comes next season. What about Duggers specifically? Pro: He's my kind of player. He's dreamy. He takes set pieces and he's left-footed so if we've got Ryan and Charlie standing over a ball, the goalie doesn't know what's coming. He's young enough to improve and we would make a big profit on him. He is willing to come and willing to take a pay cut. Cons: His wife is... yeah. His agent is a dick."

  "But he sacked his agent."

  "Yes, true."

  "So he's free to do what he wants."

  "If we sign him the agent might say, whoa! I set up that deal! Pay me for setting up that deal! Or whatever."

  "It doesn't sound like a problem. He's cancelled. As Foquita would say: bye-bye."

  "There's a thing called reputation risk. MD talks about it more and more because we're on TV and we're getting all kinds of exposure. Think about the BBC buying Chesterness and think about all the companies who want to sponsor us. They love us because we're exciting but wholesome. Now imagine big headlines about chaos and dirty dealing at Chester. Quotes from Weasel like 'Max Best stole my player' and all kinds of guff like that. You might think yeah who cares, we need that player. Okay but it could be the BBC are fifty-fifty about buying season two and some b-boys are fifty-fifty about leasing a hospitality box and those headlines are the thing that shuts it down. Could cost us a million pounds. It probably won't and it's possible it could work the other way and the constant drama and exposure works for us but you have to consider things like that. MD thinks about it all the time. Ironically that helps me when it comes to gambling sponsors and crypto crap. I said I don't want it and he went okay then."

  "You're not into crypto?"

  "There are some Bitcoin guys who own football teams and they talk a lot of sense. One guy has an article on the club's website called Why You Shouldn't Buy Bitcoin. I like that. He's not trying to scam his fans into buying something they don't understand and he wants Bitcoin to become a medium of exchange. You know, instead of pounds and dollars. That part's fine but when you have clubs promoting crypto as an investment, that gets shady very quickly. Do a search for John Terry NFT to see how much money people lost piling into that whole mess. Or I can save you a click - they lost 99%. I don't want tech bros telling this club's fans they aren't true fans unless they buy fucking nonsense from us. I know Henri dabbles in crypto but that's as part of a whole portfolio. He isn't taking financial advice from John Terry and Paris Hilton. Why are we talking about this?"

  "I don't know." We stared at each other, confused. Dan said, "Charlie Dugdale?"

  "I'll buy him if MD feels comfortable but if he doesn't, that's fine. Er... Charlie is no more than five percent of our portfolio. The value of Charlie Dugdale may go down as well as up. Charlie Dugdale's past performance is no guarantee of future returns. Do not buy more Charlie Dugdales than you can afford to lose."

  "I put money into Henri's syndicate. Is that safe?"

  "Which one?"

  "He's got more than one?"

  "Yeah. He's got one for players at Saltney and another funding Chester's new pitch at Ellesmere Port."

  Dan nodded wisely. "That one's his mum."

  "What?"

  Dan closed his eyes. "Can you pretend I didn't say that?"

  "Um... sure. I'll pretend my head didn't just explode. I can do that."

  "I'm in the Saltney Syndicate. You bought some players but we don't know much about them except they're all seventeen."

  "Ah, no, those are in the northern powerhouse project - that's nothing to do with Henri, that's my Welsh thing. I'm scouting the under seventeens and under elevens first and I'm building two pretty sweet sides already." For the under elevens I'd decided the floor would be PA 100. It was harder with the older boys because the best ones had mostly been scouted. If I could build an under-eighteen squad where everyone was at least PA 75, that would be awesome. "Saltney got Vincent and Tockers and we signed three lads for the first team. One's twenty, two are nineteen. They've come from the National League and National League North. They bulk up the squad and have some potential to grow. Good investments." Those three were the low-hanging fruit - guys with League Two PA I could buy cheap and who lived within an hour of Saltney.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  "I feel sorry for Tockers."

  "Why?"

  "He's just come from the beach in Brazil, landed in north Wales, he's not in the team and the weather's foul."

  "They don't have beaches where he's from. Incredibly, some of Brazil is inland."

  Dan half-smiled. "You know what I mean."

  "I think he's okay," I said. If I added Saltney's men's first team to the Panopticon, I would know for sure. "He's hanging out with Henri and Luisa and he's getting to know Foquita and Pascal and so on. He's not first pick but he's getting some minutes as a professional footballer. That goes a long way, doesn't it? And the weather can't stay this shit. Let me know if you ever see him sobbing in the dressing room."

  "I ain't no snitch. Can I ask another question?"

  I sighed. "Is it going to be the question that all this is about? Or do you still need to build up to that?"

  He blushed slightly and mumbled, "Still need to build up to that."

  "Ask away, Dan. Just don't ask for a transfer."

  He blushed even deeper and took a minute to compose himself. Busted! Eventually, he said, "After the United match we did loads of defensive work and I thought that was really strange. Not your style. It was good, don't get me wrong, much more interesting than - " He stopped. He was going to say 'more interesting than when Vimsy does it'. Peter's drills combined shape work with having the ball so it was thousands of times more enjoyable than Vimsy's old-school methods.

  "I tried to get Peter to come and join us," I said.

  Dan's eyes widened. "Instead of Sandra?"

  "No, in addition. I mean, he'd be a coach." I decided not to mention I wanted Peter as a player.

  "Why would he leave Bayern to be a coach here?"

  "He wouldn't," I said. "Had to try though, didn't I?" I scrunched up my face as I remembered the conversation we'd had. "He said he was flattered but he couldn't accept my offer. He said he had got what he came for and he was grateful. I think I gave him enough of a kick up the arse to make him want to be a manager himself. He'll go back to Bayern in a few days and he'll finish the season but he'll be looking out for job openings. That's what I think, anyway. All I know is I realised he was leaving, proper leaving, so I thought fuck it, let's use him while we've got him."

  "Oh. It wasn't because we were playing Chesterfield."

  I laughed - a big one. "What? We play Man United and train as normal but then I wake up in a cold sweat at the thought of Chesterfield? What are you on?"

  He grinned. "It makes sense that it was about Peter. We couldn't quite get our heads around it. Like I didn't think we were that bad against United."

  "I'm fairly happy with the defence. We've progressed, haven't we? Christian and Zach are one of the best partnerships in the league." I closed my eyes and tried to remember the Chesterfield game. "I enjoyed that match. It's a banana skin, isn't it, the game after a big game. You've put so much psychic energy into the big one you don't even know who's coming next. It's normal for standards to slip but no, we were very professional. Solid defence, control of midfield, two goals from Dazza, up to seventh in the league. Very nice. Professional. And a big win for the all-weather pitches, yeah? This time last year we could barely train. Now we're squeezing every bit of quality out of you mugs."

  "I liked the Barrow match," said Dan. "One-nil and their shithousery didn't bother us. Clean sheet, solid, Foquita with the winner, and Bradford lost. It was that feeling like last season. We were reeling them in. It's exhilarating."

  Dan was fascinating. Most footballers, even the smart ones, didn't throw long words around. "It was a good win, yeah. I'm starting to hate going to Barrow. The roads are shit. Hang on." I read a fairly long text from TJ and replied thanking him for keeping me in the loop. "Okay this is interesting. Davies is Bradford's top target and his club have rejected four bids already today. Either Chip doesn't realise he looks like a fool or he doesn't care. Apparently Bradford are also bidding for a left back and right back. That's interesting because on paper, Carl is the weak link in the team. Credit to Folke for spotting that." Another text came that I devoured. "Fascinating. I'm sure Chip would overpay for these players if he could but it has leaked that he genuinely has one point five million and not a dime more, so the three clubs that were colluding are now competing. If Chip overpays for Gareth Davies, that's less money for the other clubs. They're all rushing to get their deals done."

  "It's like when pirates turn on each other."

  "Yeah. It happens in the hit TV show The Traitors. The traitors would pretty much always win if they genuinely worked as a team but around episode six they turn on each other. Great TV, questionable strategy. If Chip's got a limit then it makes sense to maximise your slice of the pie. I think it's called mercantilism."

  I replied to a few texts while Dan got his own phone out. After a while he said, "The theory of mercantilism posits that there is a fixed amount of wealth in the world and thus every trade has winners or losers. Do you believe that?"

  "No. You can grow the pie and make both sides richer. It's idiotic to ignore the last thousand years of history when forming your trade policies."

  Dan put his phone away and I sensed he was very, very close to asking the real question. "Do you think Ian Evans talks to his players about art, squad-building, Napoleon, and trade?"

  The idea was amusing, to say the least, but I got a call from Sandra.

  "Hi, boss!" she said. "What's the latest?"

  I frowned. "It's not February yet. You're off work."

  "I'm back tomorrow!"

  "Aiden will batter me if I mess up your maternity leave."

  She tutted. "Max, it's over. I'm back. Talk to me."

  "No. Tomorrow means tomorrow."

  She let out a kind of a wail. "On Christmas Eve, little baby Lane-Beeks gets to unwrap one present. You said! This is my Christmas Eve, Max! Give me one present."

  I couldn't argue with that. "Two more clubs got in touch about Dan," I said, which provoked another weird reaction from the man in question. "How much should I sell him for?"

  "Where is he now? Silver? Bronze?"

  Dan was CA 63 which in my League Two rankings was... "Bronze," I mumbled, turning away from him. Gossiping about Bradford was one thing; introducing my players to my internal ranking system was not smart. "Silver by the end of the season for sure."

  "Two hundred thousand?" she said, plucking a figure out of the air. To be fair, Dan was virtually impossible to price properly because I didn't know what his ceiling was. His PA was minus one. In my years of scouting I had spotted a total of five players with negative PAs. I had two of the five.

  "Yeah," I said, turning back so that Dan could hear. "It's ludicrous, isn't it? He demolished Newcastle and Man United single-handed. Not for sale. Okay bye."

  "No," said Sandra. "That's not my Christmas present. Come on." I smiled and told her the latest about Charlie Dugdale and what was going on at Bradford. "And what's the latest with Foquita? Did you kiss and make up yet?"

  "Dan," I said. "What's Fuckwitta doing?"

  Dan turned around and rose the exact same way as Wee Bonnie. "He's on his phone. Video call. Getting salty with Caramel."

  "Go and punch him in the dick and yell 'team spirit, learn it.'"

  "Do no such thing," Sandra shouted down the phone. I heard Aiden complaining in the background. Sandra said something to me and hung up.

  Dan faced the front again and fussed with the denim around his knees. Maybe that was how his clothes ended up with rips - his jeans weren't designed like that but were the result of him worrying away the fabric. "Why didn't we use Relationism against Gillingham?"

  I shook my head. Another complete swerve of the topic but I was getting the sense that everything he was asking me was connected, even though it didn't seem possible. "Why are you asking about Gillingham? Why not Barrow?"

  We had used Relationism in the FA Youth Cup Fourth Round against Port Vale. The next first team match was Barrow.

  "Barrow are a handful and their pitch was in a state. It makes sense you wouldn't use it against them. But Gillingham are weak, you said, and the pitch at the Deva was decent. If not then, when? Weren't you happy with the Youth Cup?"

  ***

  On Wednesday, January 14, three days after playing at Old Trafford, I used full-blown Relationism for the second time.

  3 R Welsh were back on the league treadmill, playing against another army unit in their gaff. 3R's Morale was quite low which I found out was because they hadn't got some new kit they'd been promised. Army kit, not football kit. Not for the first time I was thankful that the universe hadn't put me in Dylan's shoes; I would hate army life more than the call centre.

  I was pretty wiped out from all the effort I had put into the United match but now that we were out of the FA Cup I actually felt a lot more mentally stable. One branch of potential fixtures had been pruned and there was much more certainty about the rest of our season. If the Relationism module turned 3R's match into an insane Candy Crush fantasy, this was the perfect time and setting; I would be able to deal with it and no-one was watching.

  "Lads, I want to do Bestball from the start and do the whole ninety. Is that okay with you?"

  "Yes," said Dylan, answering for everyone.

  "That was easy. Top."

  Pascal warmed them up and I encountered an all-new curse screen. It felt like something that should have come from Henri's head, not mine. The screen was a simple cold-blue rectangle with two words on it.

  Mood: Introspective.

  That stayed in place for about eight seconds - maybe the imps had designed the showers at Mansfield - before I got the Relationism screen.

  The match kicked off and while I was dreading all kinds of mad colours and meters filling up giving me hits of dopamine, it didn't pan out like that.

  Everything was vaguely blue, including the player icons in the mini-map. After the usual start, where both teams lined up in 4-4-2, my guys drifted to form the blob and played short passes to each other. As they did, their icons changed colour, becoming redder.

  Fatso was the heart of the team and got on the ball the most. His icon turned the reddest and he was involved in the most one-twos. Instead of the mad, in-your-face excess of the Youth Cup match, this time there was only one meter. It filled very, very slowly - possibly because 3R weren't doing flicks, tricks, skills, nutmegs, or even many rivers.

  When the meter did fill, which took 14 minutes, I popped it and got a pleasant tingling sensation in my ears and neck. One of the icons turned pure yellow. My attention was drawn to the player it represented - Hot Rod. I saw his Morale was abysmal and in the next break, subbed him off. It was rolling subs; he could return after our chat.

  "Mate," I said. "You all right?"

  "Yes, Max."

  "You're not your usual self. Talk to me."

  He bent and touched his toes. He straightened. "Not having the best time, Max. Work's shit, things aren't going well with my girlfriend."

  I nodded a few times. "Do you want to sit this one out?"

  His eyes darted around. The answer was obviously yes. "We've only got two subs. The lads need me."

  I spread my arms wide. "What's the point having a superstar manager if he can't win without one player?" My arrogance made Hot Rod smile. I continued. "I play shit when my head's not right; everyone does. It's just a game. Games are supposed to be fun, yeah?" Hot Rod's smile came back for another unscheduled public appearance. Wee Bonnie was a master motivator!

  "This is fun, Max. Boss. It's... It's a good distraction. Sorry for not playing well."

  He was on 5 out of 10 but low ratings were pretty normal with the army players. "I don't think it's that," I mused, as I tried to work out what was going on. This was 'introspection mode', was it? Was I introspective or was it the players? Or did the curse want us to get introspective? "You're playing okay but you're not in the blob, you're in your head. You're somewhere else. Focus on the ball and your mates, see if you can get into the flow. Or not. Whatever! But if you want to fuck off down the pub, we'll come and pick you up when we're done."

  "Doing dry January boss." He looked out at the pitch. "Can I go back on?"

  I sent him back out and almost immediately, his match rating increased and his icon got redder. The general energy levels rose, it felt to me, and the bar filled up faster. It took about ten minutes and when I popped it, two of the icons flashed black.

  I smiled. This was weird but enjoyable. A tiny mystery!

  It didn't take me long to 'solve' this one.

  The way I asked 3 R to form the blob was that one player should stand outside it in a defensive pose. That guy was the safety net for when we lost the ball and the oppo launched a fast counter. The blob had been trained to storm back as fast as they could as soon as there was danger and it was the outsider's job to buy us enough time to get into position. We sometimes played the ball back to this person but they were very much on the fringes.

  The second who had flashed was playing on the opposite side to the blob, waiting for a big diag. He was the player most likely to score but until then his job involved a lot of sprints into the box, jogging back onside, making another run. Lonely work. Someone like Pascal loved that kind of role but many others didn't.

  I didn't have much control over the players but I could decide who did the 'outside' roles. These two guys clearly felt disconnected from the rest of the team. I swapped them around and once they joined the blob, their cold blue icons started to warm up.

  "That's working," said Pascal. "That surprises me."

  "Because they aren't suited to those positions?"

  "Yes."

  "I forgot something I learned in Brazil. They talk about energy there. Passing the ball is like sharing energy with your mate. Those two guys were on the outside not getting any energy. We have to rotate and keep people involved. Don't let them get cold."

  "Cold! Yes, the match felt cold. It is warming up now."

  That's what the icons were telling me. I experimented with how frequently to rotate the players. Not so much that it became a carousel, but not so little that players got cold. At a certain point, the icons of all the players warmed up enough to trigger a hidden event. The mini-map glowed with a warm light and I was awarded a 'Five Minute Bench Boost' token. I broke the habit of a lifetime and used it almost straight away - after subbing a few players off and on for a tactical chat, of course.

  By half time the mood was much improved. We were winning two-nil and happily chatting away. Pascal's enthusiasm was the icing on the cake and when Dylan roared, "Come on Welsh!" the rest responded like they meant it.

  At the start of the second half, the new screen appeared again. My vision turned pink and two words appeared.

  Mood: Determined.

  ***

  "Was I happy with the Youth Cup," I repeated, to buy myself some time. "What was your experience of the West Ham match? The end, I mean."

  Dan squashed his features up as he attempted to put the feeling into words. "A bit mad. Wild. Wild abandon!"

  "You're too young for wild abandon, mate."

  "Youth is wasted on the young," he said. He made unusually strong eye contact with me. "I felt I had all the energy in the world and I could have run for days. The more we passed to each other the more intense it got and you were laughing your head off like you were on the pitch with us and you could feel it and we were going yeah this is the new football we're pioneers we're astronauts we're invincible. I did some reading about mass hysteria and that's what it felt like."

  "You're such an interesting guy, Dan."

  "Ditto," he said, repeating one of my current favourite phrases. "But at Port Vale it didn't feel the same and you only wanted us to do it for the first half. I was wondering if we'd done it wrong."

  "I think against West Ham we were all hyper for it, weren't we? It was a big explosion after a long wait. Plus we had absolutely battered West Ham so our mood was already just... off the scale. Then against Vale there was a fair chunk of apprehension along with the excitement. You might say the mood was nervous apprehension."

  "Yes!" cried Dan. "That's exactly how I felt!"

  Nervous apprehension was the 'mood' screen text but I still didn't know if it referred to me or the players. If I was happy but the players were sad, which would it choose? "We are so much better than Port Vale it didn't really matter how we approached the game. My plan was always to do Relationism for the first half." The feedback loop that day was all about helping players become less anxious. I did it by asking them to do fewer tricks, megs, and skills, and keep things simple. "You guys were all focused on doing flicks and shit, weren't you?"

  "Yeah because you were so fire when we did madnesses against West Ham, we thought we had to keep doing that."

  As I had eased them into a more confident state, the curse had rewarded me with mini-boosts. "I helped you calm down and you were able to get into the flow."

  "Yes. Wibbers scoring a first half hat trick helped, too."

  "Yeah, I bet. To answer your question, I was delighted with how you played against Port Vale. They're a League One side and it's not actually normal that a club like us blows past them. I expect it, you expect it, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't take a moment to be proud. Mostly I stopped doing it against Vale because it was funny."

  "How?"

  I adjusted on my seat. This was the part of the bus ride when I didn't want anyone next to me; I had wanderlust. Quick tour of the bus, come back and spread out. "Right, so, think of us from Vale's point of view. Against West Ham we finished with ten minutes of utter slaps. Port Vale were thinking we would do the same again - ten minutes at the end to run down the clock. Instead we did it for the first half - the entire half. In the break they're coming up with mad schemes and plans for how to defend it. They made substitutions and probably talked of nothing apart from how to defend the blob."

  "But second half - there's no blob."

  "Right. As much as I want to learn to use Relationism, I don't want to overuse it because there are a lot of smart people in this game. They will develop countermeasures. Or maybe not - every game with it seems to be different. The technical and tactical side is pretty straightforward so I think it's all about managing emotions and getting people into the flow. Yeah, look, when we get into the blob it's undeniably cool and I'm relieved it isn't just a sugar rush. It could be a valid way of playing in certain matches. I think what's supposed to happen in a typical game is that you lot start in some state and we have to work through it and get more positive and at the very end we will have that explosion of togetherness we had against West Ham. Something like that, I think. I know one thing - the feeling with 3R and our eighteens is totally different. There's something about you that Relationism absolutely loves."

  "How would you defend against it?"

  "Good question. I'll tell you when someone does it to us."

  "Will we do it against Everton?"

  "That will be like West Ham. If we're well ahead near the end, why not? Text from the lawyer. One sec."

  Gemma: Weasel isn't playing nice.

  Me: Okay, fuck him. The guy always overreaches. He gets nothing. Tell Duggers he's staying at Reading and we'll get him a good move in the summer.

  Gemma: Whoa! My doomsday clock says we have about an hour before we go nuclear.

  Me: Nope. I have exploded.

  Gemma: One hour. Let me do my thing.

  Me: Fine.

  Gemma: You've got a nickname with these agents, you know.

  Me: I know. Starboy.

  Gemma: Scrooge MaxDuck.

  I must have grinned as I put my phone away because Dan was grinning, too. "Was it awkward when you fessed up how you fancy Emma's best mate?"

  "Don't remember doing that."

  "It was just before or just after you put Julie McKay on a slab."

  "Where do you get these phrases? What is going on?"

  "Seriously, though. Wasn't that awkward?"

  "I thought it would be, yeah. I asked to talk to her at the next training sesh and I started to apologise but she said no need. I was like yeah but there is. She said it was all good and the girls had been teasing her about it."

  "That doesn't sound good."

  "I know but she liked it because she's always thought everyone was being off with her because her boyfriend was prime suspect in my murder and the teasing was when she knew she was really in the group."

  "That's... quite strange."

  "She said that Henri had apologised and explained it anyway. He thought I would say the person with the worst partner was Youngster and we would all have a laugh at Meghan, who can take it. He didn't expect me to be so explosive. Yeah. Then I told her I was taking the Saltney women's team more seriously and I was going to ask her to join it in the summer but I didn't want her to think it was a punishment or anything like that and if she wanted I would make some calls to other clubs because she could easily be the main striker for most of the teams we were playing."

  "But not for Chester."

  "Have you seen Kit?"

  "Yeah," he said, with a gormless look on his face. He realised how he sounded and sat up. "She's very gifted."

  I made a tiny scoffing noise. "Julie was happy to know I wanted her on my personal team and she likes the idea of being with her mates. I told her if it turns into Chester B it's going to get crazy good crazy fast but there's no money in it. She's got time to think about it."

  "You like the idea of your former players being around."

  "In normal times, Julie would be Chester's starting striker for the next ten years."

  "These are not normal times."

  "No," I agreed. I sighed. "What's Foquita doing?"

  "He's in the aisle and Pascal, Henri, and Zach are talking to him. It looks quite intense. Henri's putting him on blast."

  "Sneak up behind Foquita and kick him in the back of the knee. When he falls, smack his head against the nearest armrest and say something awesome."

  TJ: Bradford deals incoming. Stand by.

  "Oh, shit," I said. "Here we go. Er, distract me. Wait, you wanted something. We've talked around it enough, right? Now's a good time to punch me in the dick."

  "It's not... Okay but we won the two games after United. The first team did. And the eighteens won in the Youth Cup so everything was going great. Then we played Gillingham and that was going fine. Two-nil up but Cole gives a shit back pass, Sticky gives away a penalty and that's his second yellow card. We're down to ten, Banksy's first job is to pick the ball out of the net. We defend well but they score with the last kick of the game."

  "Slap in the face."

  "Two-all and even worse, Sticky's got a one-match ban. You've agreed to sign a goalie but he won't join until after the Vans Trophy semi-final. No big deal because he's only a backup. Except he plays and breaks his finger."

  I got the feeling Dan was, in his own way, as angry with life as Foquita was, he just had a more subtle way of showing it. I found myself defending Swanny. "While saving two pens in the shoot-out."

  "Right. But you sign him even though he's injured."

  "He's only out for six weeks. It's minor. Even the insurance company doesn't give a shit."

  "But we didn't have a senior goalie for the big game against Mansfield! One of our title rivals."

  "What do you want me to do? Loan a goalie for one match?"

  "Would you have done it against Bradford?"

  "Don't know. Maybe."

  "Why did you let Eddie go before Cole is really ready?"

  "It was his last chance to get proper paid. Look, it's mad luck, isn't it? You could play Soccer Supremo for a hundred years and nothing like this would happen. Cole plays that pass to Sticky's strong foot a hundred times out of a hundred and on a decent surface Sticky blasts it safely into row Z. I'm not mad at them for one loose pass and for the shit pitches they have to play on. Gillingham are a good team. They'll have a go at anyone who goes down to ten men. And by the way, today's game was a complete aberration. I was there on the touchline getting royally drenched thinking should I bring myself on? Okay I'm better than the Mansfield players but what would I actually do? Kick the ball really high and see where the wind blows it? We've had freak events. You can't base your transfer strategy for the next five years around a bit of wind or a broken finger. Swanny's a great signing for this club. The timing's unfortunate but shit happens."

  "Okay but when you meet him, Swanny is at Reading and you tell him he can stay for the cup because you think it's the right thing and he breaks his finger but you sign him anyway because you think it's the right thing. And because you did the right thing we've got a teenager in goal and a teenage goalie on the bench. Oh, and your star striker is in a huff because we let in two basic goals. This isn't my big question but would you do it again?"

  "Would I let Eddie go a bit earlier than is ideal for me but is perfect for him? Would I let Swanny stay at Reading to help his manager out? I mean... yes. You can say it has cost us four points but... in five years we'll look back at this last couple of weeks and say these were Banksy's first league minutes and this was what set him on his path to stardom."

  "We're out of the playoff places."

  I was getting wound up by the negativity. "And how does that make you feel?"

  "I don't really care. I trust you."

  That deflated my rapidly-growing balloon. "So... I don't really know what we're..."

  "I think I just want to say that I'm really happy to be at a club that does the right thing."

  You know when a magician pulls a tablecloth and there's loads of glasses and cutlery that is supposed to stay perfectly still? Dan was the magician and I was a quite expensive set of wine glasses. I wobbled and crashed. "You are?"

  "Do you remember when you scouted me?"

  "Yes. Das Tournament. Beth wrote an article about it. I read it about 40 times and convinced myself I was a wizard. I'm not. I'm fumbling around in the dark same as anyone else."

  "What made you think I was good?"

  "That fact that you're good."

  "But we did those little matches against the Chester lot and it was like you wanted them to lose and at the end there was this mad delay before you ran around whooping."

  "I don't whoop."

  "What was that all about?"

  "Sometimes things aren't about anything. Sometimes I eat too much cheese and have to burn off the energy."

  "You don't want to say. That's fine. It'll bug me forever but that's fine." He paused and clicked one of his knuckles. "Did you know I got scouted before?"

  "No. That's hard to believe. Not that I doubt you. What I'm saying is that even a dinosaur would snap you up. You have the x-factor."

  He dipped his head and - I think - flushed with pleasure. "It was this older guy. Like forty-five or something mad."

  "Mad."

  "He liked the look of me. Told my dad. Came round for tea."

  "Which club was he?"

  "Stoke City."

  "Big club."

  "Yeah. Dad was chuffed and the guy was raving about me. We had a long talk and I was really excited but nervous."

  "Nervous Apprehension."

  He laughed. "Nervous Apprehension: The Dan Badford Story."

  I shook my head. "Your book would be called It's Badford Not Bradford."

  He rocked his head back. "Yeah. So the Stoke guy seems to be doing well, I thought, but my mum gets up and asks my dad to help her with the biscuits."

  I smiled. "That sounds like something I've seen."

  "No, boss. Sorry but no. Not in my house. Mum can carry a plate of biscuits, do you know what I mean? Dad got up and they went to the kitchen and I was like what the actual crap is happening here? It was one of the strangest moments in my life. Dad comes back almost instantly with the biscuits and mum makes more teas. When she comes in, dad says, I think we've heard enough to give Stoke City first refusal on Dan. You can tell your bosses you've wrapped it up. Which I thought was a strange thing to focus on and a big jump because they hadn't talked about money or the details or anything and my dad would normally have been all over those things."

  "Yeah," I mused. Clearly Dan's parents had gone to the kitchen for a rapid strategy session. The plan was to tell the scout it was a done deal. Why?

  Dan continued. "It all happened so fast but at the time it was agonisingly slow. I was like okay where are my boots, my tracksuits, what's my email address at Stoke City, when do I get PhotoShopped into the team photo?"

  "Ha. You little shit."

  He dipped his head, acknowledging his little shitness. "The scout relaxed and mum took over. Just chats, you know. Easy chat over tea and biccies. Not even the best china or anything. She switched him off."

  "Hmm," I said. I was starting to get the shape of the story.

  "What happens next is a slow-motion dismantling of this scout. Mum peels his layers off one by one and suddenly he's giving us the real inside track on life as a footballer. He was a player at Sheffield United and Rotherham and other clubs and his career was non-stop torment. He got screwed over again and again but he couldn't shift the bug and he kept in the industry even though he hated it. Later my mum said he was like a bone and football was the dog that was gnawing at him. We hear about the bullies and the liars and the fantasists and it's scary how little self-awareness he has. He despises football. Everything about him is a warning. He leaves and me and my parents spend a few days looking into the dark side of football and it's all gambling, addiction, depression, bankruptcy. I read about players who were bullied and ostracised because they wanted to go to galleries instead of pubs, because they like indie bands, because they know a few long words."

  "Because they wear big puffy jackets and jeans with holes in."

  Dan scoffed. "We all decide, yeah nah."

  "Yeah nah," I repeated. "Youngster was pretty similar."

  "We agreed that I would go to the trial and fluff my lines so that the scout wouldn't get in trouble."

  "That's decent of you."

  "Yeah, well, we liked the man. Dad decided that faking injury was the way to go. If they thought I could be kicked out of a match, they wouldn't care how good I was. And he was right. They said they'd be in touch and they never did. Bosh. I was free. Then you turned up."

  Knowing the end of the story got me slightly emotional. "You saw me working on the culture."

  "I only wanted to play football and get some free coaching. I love playing, boss, I really do. There was something different here from day one but I told my parents as soon as it turns toxic I'm out. Every time there was something I didn't like you turned up and screamed at someone. In a good way. And then the Maxterplans. It's like, where else is the boss talking about the Cambrian Era and Babylonian maps? Zach's turned into one of the best defenders in League Two, hasn't he? That's because you love that he's a big dinosaur freak and he gets to be himself."

  "Did you see him at half time?" I said, smiling.

  "When he was raging at us?" said Dan.

  "That's what we needed. I'm no good in conditions like that. I hate wind. Football shouldn't be played in wind. I was sulking, mate, plain and simple. Up steps Zach and Vimsy to do the yelling. It's not all beautiful moves, is it? Sometimes you need graft and a bit of the old caveman mentality. Diversity doesn't mean ticking boxes, it means having loads of people so you've got loads of skills. I'm proud of Zach. Today was the exact right time for him to get up and holler."

  "I think I know what you mean. We still lost 2-1 though, didn't we? You can't shout a gale force wind away. I prefer Zach when he's nerding out over fossils. Then there's Henri. His Christmas play, his party, the way he talks about philosophy. I just... I just love it. It makes me enjoy the tactics talk with Wibbers and Pascal and that lot. And I even don't mind some of the other banter."

  "Like what?"

  "You know, the more basic stuff. Marry, fuck, kill or whatever."

  "Emma, Camila, Foquita. Decide."

  "No," he laughed. "No way." He appeared to think about it for a moment and I knew which of the choices was giving him pause. He shook his head to get rid of the entire mental process. "The thing is..."

  My phone vibrated but Dan was about to tell me the thing he had been trying to tell me the entire ride. I ignored the phone and stared at him. You have my undivided attention.

  He licked his lips. "The thing is, you've been saying how I'm not for sale and all that kind of thing but everyone knows that means you're inviting bids. Pascal says you're creating FOMO and building a market for me. Because, you know, you want to sell me one day."

  I opened my mouth to speak, then shut it again.

  Dan said, "I just... I've heard even more stories now. From Vimsy, from Ryan, from Jackie Reaper. From Sam. From Josh Owens," he added. He got very fidgety. "I don't think I could hack it at another club. There's no way I'd fit in. I think... I think I don't want a normal football career. I want to stay at Chester and go to museums with Zach and Henri and listen to you do just utterly mad team talks and go ape if someone forgets to translate for Dani. And yeah okay it's cool other managers are interested in me but I'm not interested in them, boss. There's no-one like you." His eyes were getting red. "I don't want to go."

  I rubbed my eyebrows pretty hard and I can't say I was completely unmoved by Dan's words. "Whoo," I said. "All right. Didn't expect that." I adjusted the tray hinge thing. How did it keep getting out of place? Oh, right. Because I kept punching it. Funny, that. All my frustration was long gone and I felt at peace. "First thing, I'm pimping you out not to sell you but to get you an England call-up."

  "Oh."

  "I think I thought that was obvious."

  "It wasn't."

  "Gotcha. How can I put this? I won't sell you until I think you've hit your ceiling." I lifted myself up and looked around. Foquita was in a different seat but it was obvious by his posture that he was holding his phone up. I thought I detected a smile but he normally only smiled just after scoring. "These guys, I know their limits. Eddie Moore, Sam Topps, Cavvers, even Sharky, I knew how long they had left until they peaked so I could judge their value. You? I have no fucking clue. The eye test is unreliable but I can't believe you can play like that against the Prem teams and, well, not be a Prem player. But I don't know. If someone offers me two million pounds for, say, Zach, or Bark, I'd take it because it's easy to imagine that's a win-win. You? I have no idea but someone's winning that deal."

  "What makes me different?"

  "Don't know. Don't care. I'm enjoying the journey. Aren't you?"

  "Yeah," he said. "Okay but this Charlie Dugdale. You said you recommended him to Ruth. She's got Youngster, Wibbers, Dazza, Angel. Sorry but it's obvious those are the players you think can go far, right? Why didn't you ever suggest me?"

  My eyes widened and I nodded hard. "Great question. It's because I don't know. Should we, should Ruth take a risk? Probably. But..." I smiled. "You've talked yourself into a corner, haven't you?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean if you're worth ten grand a week and I offer you three, you've told me you don't want to go anywhere else. It's Chester or a call centre. I can exploit you. I learned that from Karl Marx. Maybe not what he intended when he wrote his book."

  Dan bit his bottom lip before exhaling. "I don't think you'll exploit me that much. But yeah, an agent is no good to me, is she? If I want to be a one-club man."

  My phone was going mental but I tried to ignore it. "Might not be a bad idea for you to talk to Ruth. You can get some Grindhog gear for free, at least. Listen, Dan. If you want to stay here, you can, as long as you keep improving. If you stop improving tomorrow we have a big problem because in eighteen months this club will be in the Championship. Do you get me? It's not a charity. If you keep improving you can come all the way. You know I need money to build all the shit I need to build but I also need someone press-resistant who can run my midfield so it's not a hardship for me to keep you around. Heh. But I think football isn't as bad as that scout made out. You listen to the modern England players, Saka, Bingley, Kane, and they're not monsters, are they? They're really decent. I know there are still clubs that sound like they're from the 80s but I honestly, honestly think it's a mistake to close off the idea completely."

  "Like... what club would I fit in?"

  I smiled. "Mate, you're not that weird, are you? Sam Topps loved you from the start and it's not like you're disruptive or a teacher's pet or you slack off in training. I've been crunching the numbers for the kinds of budgets I might get in our first year in the Championship and it's grim. Grim in a hilarious way. Even when we get to the Prem and I've got a hundred mill to waste I'm not going to be paying seventy grand a week. Imagine you're on five grand and I want to sell you to a club that would give you seventy or eighty thousand a week. Do that for two years and you're made for life. You and your family and the people you care about. Do you know what I mean? You can do something shit for two years, can't you? It doesn't have to be completely depressing. When it's over I'll take you back or you can do Saltney or West or all kinds of things but you won't ever have to worry about money again. And it could help you grow as a person. I don't like to imagine you unhappy but I do like to imagine you growing and becoming even more the person you want to be."

  "I watched the video from when you did your Cambrian Era speech. It said the creatures started evolving because there was a predator."

  "What's that saying?" I rubbed my eyes; it had been a long day. "Oysters need grit to make pearls. Something like that but pithy. What I don't want is to send you somewhere that's all grit. Just enough hardship so that you can grow. And while you're working on yourself, you're trousering three million a year after tax." I laughed. "I don't know. I'm just saying don't rule it out just yet."

  "I can go and come back?"

  "If you're good enough, yeah. You have to assume Chester gets better every year."

  "The Relentlessness."

  "Exactly." I unclipped the seat tray and pulled it down so I could fidget with it. "Today was shit. Today was really shit. I'm not sure we can win the league now."

  "Fuck."

  "Bradford are back to 18 points clear. We've got those three games in hand. Can we win all three? Yes. Can we make up 9 points on them in the other games? Yes. Mansfield are 15 points clear but we have played the same number of games. They have beaten us home and away. Can we make those points up? Maybe. Can we overtake both? Yeahhhhhh maybe." I lifted the tray and let it drop. "We have to go on a winning run. Three of the next four matches are tough as hell: Carlisle, Fleetwood, Burton. Then it's a ten-game stretch ripe for a winning streak and two of the last three games could go either way. Yeah, I think we can get close enough to put pressure on. Close enough for one of the two teams to crack. But both? Not sure..."

  I thought for a while before pushing the tray home and clipping it into place.

  "Dan, don't fret. You control your career and I only want what's best for you. I honestly think a bit of an adventure might do you good. You can go to Germany or something like that, you know, where the culture is less brutish and you can't understand what they're saying anyway. I'm thinking about next season and I'm pretty sure we are going to absolutely fucking crush. My mum's all right and I'm thinking ahead. One day soon I'll be married to Ems and there will be little baby Maxes all over the place and I won't be thinking about living abroad ever again. If I want to do it, I need to do it now because I'll be the most boring stay-at-home dad who ever dadded, I'm pretty sure of that. The thought gives me that wanderlust, do you know what I mean? Being a tourist is all right - well, no, it's shit - but living somewhere new? Only for three months or something but why not? Sandra can run Chester. It'll be a piece of piss." I stared into the future. "I want to get it out of my system. Make some memories. You might prefer to do it when you're old and that's all right. Just think about it is all I'm saying." I laughed.

  "What's funny?" said Dan.

  "I was just thinking about you at Stoke or some club like that and it's a bit cavemanny. Some pricks are giving you shit because you used a word longer than two syllables and you just point at one and say, 'Max Best thinks you're dogshit'. Heh. That would be him cooked, I think. They'd learn not to fuck about with you."

  Dan smiled. "You're so arrogant."

  "Arrogance makes the heart grow fonder."

  "That's not the expression."

  That was the moment Foquita appeared in the aisle next to us - with his arm wrapped around Banksy's neck. Banksy was grinning from ear to ear. I knew that look. It was that of someone who had been talking to Camila. Foquita babbled and held up his phone. A tired Camila was looking back. "Max. It is okay. Foquita understands."

  "Good," I said. "Tell him I am happy with his progress." I turned the phone back, heard some Spanish, watched as his smile got huge. I flipped the phone back. "Tell him I'm so happy with his progress I'm putting him on a special training programme."

  She told him and his grin got wider, but he spotted the looks on Dan's and Banksy's faces and his smile diminished. Camila asked me to explain what it meant. I declined. She turned to Foquita's mother, said something, and they both made the sign of the cross. I ended the call and gave my player his phone back. "Bye," I said.

  "Bye-bye," he said, confused, as he shuffled back to his seat.

  "What have you got planned?" said Dan.

  "Special students need special teachers. Right," I said, getting my phone out and reading quickly. "Weasel is being a dick. Okay, that's that. Case closed, deal's off. Shame, really. Let me just write this text."

  I was wondering how to word my reply when Dan reached up and touched my arm. I stared at him. He said, "He's a good player. Is he a good person?"

  "Duggers? I would say so, yeah. He'd win Celebrity Big Brother or something like that through being a bit dizzy but mostly decent. Voltaire might not get on with him."

  "Is that...?"

  "There's a quote I like. Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do. If we ask Duggers to help at a food bank he'll go but he'd never think to do something like that on his own. Does that make him a bad person?"

  "No."

  "And if I buy him for four hundred grand and sell him for two million, I can do a load of good with that money."

  Dan nodded. "So why are you canceling the deal?"

  "Because..." I said. Then I scoffed and dialled. "MD? How are you doing? Yeah, it was a bad one. Miserable. No, I still think we'll get 90 points. That gets us up, right? Yeah, that's not a problem. No, I'm not joking; I'm going to put my foot on the accelerator. Did you see the texts I sent about Chip? Father Chipmas, yeah! Listen: Charlie Dugdale. I know there's some reputation risk but he hasn't done anything wrong, we haven't done anything wrong. If his agent wants to be a dick, we rise above it. Let Gemma deal with it. Duggers is happy at Reading but that place will be a disaster zone soon. We can rescue him before the fire even starts. That's a new level of heroism, Mike. I didn't realise it until now but doing the right thing has unlocked Zach and it's why Dan is at the club. It costs us a few points here and there but you know it doesn't take much for me to double down. No, no tantrums, it's your choice. Yeah, he's worth it. You'll love him, Mike. He'll fill that stand we're building. Yeah. Dreamy. All right." I hung up.

  Dan was agog. "What did he say?"

  I shook my head. "He said he wouldn't even consider it unless Bradford City blew one point five million on guys with no resale value."

  Dan had a sad air about him for a few seconds. "But you said you'd get him a good move in the summer. He'll be all right."

  I didn't reply, unless giving him a sardonic stare counts.

  Dan's eyes narrowed. "Hang on. Why would MD say anything about Bradford when you're talking about Duggers?"

  "He wouldn't," I said, tapping on my screen. I brought up a transfer deals page and filtered it for Bradford. I showed Dan that Folke was about to spend Chip's money on three players aged 30 and over.

  Gareth Davies - Stevenage - Bradford - 730,000

  Olly Oduor - Exeter City - Bradford - 500,000

  Kent Halle - Accrington - Bradford - 270,000

  "Shit," said Dan. "That's crazy, isn't it?"

  I shrugged. "Depends if you want a financial return from those players. If you think you can ten x your investment by getting promoted, it's peanuts. We will see!"

  Dan heard some laughs from the back of the bus and I knew he was ready to go back and spend the last hour of the journey with his mates. He stood up and gripped a head rest in each hand. I felt the cogs in his brain whirring. He was such an enigma I had no idea what he would say next. He surprised me by asking the most obvious question. "What did MD say really? After you said Duggers would fill the stand and that he was dreamy?"

  I pushed the arm rest up and spread out over the two seats of my domain. "He said 'always bet on Best.'"

  ***

  Charlie Dugdale - Reading - Chester - 400,000

  ***

  Dan Badford

  Injuries: None

  Form: 7-8-10-6-5

  Morale: Superb

  Future: Thinks Max Best is a tactical genius. Proud to be playing at Chester. Wants to stay at the club for a very long time.