Only a Game

by J M Gregson

  There was more nodding around the circle, a murmured affirmation in which even Darren Pearson eventually joined, as the group tried to bolster their weakling by a restatement of the saving dogma, like a church congregation joining fervently into the responses of a service.

  Then two or three of them recounted similar falls by the wayside to that which Darren had just related, assuring him that there was strength in numbers, that he must not be discouraged, that this place and these people would help him, that the refusal to extend his credit was a blessing in itself, a tool he must use as he fought for salvation.

  The counsellor had a few words with him alone before he left, voicing the truisms he knew he must observe, insisting he should ring whenever he felt tempted.

  There was nothing subtle or magical about the session, yet he went home bolstered, feeling as he had not done before he enrolled that he had the strength to fight this, that he was not unique and above all not alone. It was only as he reviewed the group and its support in the small hours of the night that their comments seemed childish and their support too puny for his fight.

  TEN

  Liverpool at Brunton. Always one of the games of the season, but this year more than ever so. Liverpool at the top of the Premiership in a tight race, contesting the title in the last six games of the season against Manchester United and Chelsea. Brunton Rovers at the other end of the league, clear of the bottom three places at the moment, but with a tough programme of games to end the season and relegation still a possibility.

  Beautifully set up, the press and the broadcasting media had decided. The big boys going flat out for their first Premiership title of the century, the smaller team on a good run of results, with all the added spice of a Lancashire derby thrown in for good measure. The managers, players and supporters of the two teams were much too nervous to want a contest which was ‘beautifully set up’. They wanted not glorious uncertainty but a match with some assurance of points, of a victory in Liverpool’s case and of at least a point for a draw in that of the Rovers.

  Even the directors and senior officials of the two clubs had caught the excitement and the nervousness, so that there was a brittle quality to the conversation and the laughter in the board room at Grafton Park. As owner and chairman of the home team, Jim Capstick circulated among the visitors with glass in hand, as affable as he always was on these occasions. He acknowledged his team’s need for points, ruefully nodded his assent to the view that Liverpool too needed the victory, for very different reasons. He did not talk about anything beyond the end of the season in another month, but that was not required of him; with such a match beginning in less than an hour, no one cared to look beyond five o’clock today.

  Helen Capstick had an abstracted air: she was watching her husband’s progress around the room rather than involving herself in any demanding conversational exchange. With her hair the colour of polished bronze and her erect figure and carriage, she could never be unnoticeable, but she took the easy way out and retreated behind a façade of ignorance, maintaining that her scanty knowledge of football made her a loyal supporter but nothing more. She was here as a lady who wanted to give her husband every support but did not pretend to the knowledge or involvement which excited most of the others around her.

  Robbie Black was not here, of course. The Scottish manager was in the dressing room below them, bolstering his grim-faced players for the fray, stressing the tactics for the momentous ninety minutes ahead of them. But Debbie Black, still better known to most of the visitors as the glamorous tennis player and model Debbie Palmer, was making most of the men in the room think of things other than football, even with such a match in prospect. The irony was that Debbie, despite her large hazel eyes and still compelling figure, had a knowledge of the history of the game and of Brunton Rovers which would have surprised her listeners.

  Debbie reminded the visiting chairman gently that Brunton Rovers were founder members of the league and had been around much longer than Liverpool. She spoke in surprising detail about the lads from Brunton who had ventured south in the nineteenth century to win the FA Cup from the southern public school toffs who regarded it as their private competition, then pointed out the old black and white photograph in the corner of the room of those sturdy champions who had won so many cups at the end of the nineteenth century.

  Edward Lanchester relished the occasion because it reminded him of so many similar great days in the past. He was delighted to find that the old friend he had known for almost forty years was still on the Liverpool board. Joe Nolan was ten years older and more stooped than Edward, with red cheeks and a cherubic appearance which clothed a wealth of harsh experience. He had fought in the 1939–45 war, remembered coming home on leave and weeping when he found the Mersey dotted with the masts of sunken ships and his mother bombed out of her house. Both men remembered a harsher world, where it had seemed impossible for two or three years that their country could survive, where for six years there had been no football save for wartime ‘friendlies’. The octogenarian Scouser reminded Lanchester that football was an escape from the harsher realities of life, that no matter how passionately you felt about it, it was not life itself.

  ‘We’re relics of an age that’s gone,’ Joe Nolan said to the younger man, without any great bitterness. ‘It’s good of them to keep us on – sometimes I think they like to remind themselves of times when life was simpler and it was easier to see it for what it was.’

  ‘You’re a wise man, Joe,’ said Lanchester. ‘You see things as they are and don’t resent it. I envy you that.’ He told this man who was on the other side this afternoon about the death of his wife, confessed for the first time to this relative stranger how much he missed her presence and the way she had kept his judgements sound. Joe Nolan was more moved than he could explain to himself by the death of this woman he had never known and its effect upon his friend.

  Darren Pearson sat at the side of the room with his opposite number from Liverpool. He kept an eye on the busy scene to make sure all was going well, that none of the club’s visitors were being neglected, and listened to the very different problems of a club with foreign owners. Their massive investment in the club made it sound as if it was on another planet, not competing in the same league as Brunton Rovers.

  The crowded room grew quieter as these privileged people looked at their watches and began to filter out towards the cloakrooms and their seats in the main stand. Darren was the last to leave, complimenting the girls coming in to clear the room on the excellence of the food, reminding them to be sure to tell Mrs Bates that the visitors had said once more that she made the finest apple pies in Britain. He marvelled again that he could function so competently on this public level whilst losing the battle in his private war.

  All of these luminaries forgot their own concerns in the compressed ninety minutes of sporting war which began at three o’clock. It was a gloomy afternoon, and the floodlights made the football battlefield even more theatrical, illuminating the two acres of grass like a massive stage, contributing their own effect to the contest, as the skies gradually darkened around the old stadium and the world disappeared, save for the vivid green expanse and the players acting out their drama upon it.

  Liverpool took the game to a rather nervous Rovers side at first, a fierce shot narrowly missing the goal, to a collective gasp of relief from the home supporters and a collective groan from the visitors’ enclosure. Ten minutes into the match, the veteran Rovers goalkeeper pulled off a marvellous save, flicking the ball at full stretch over the corner of his goal, then rising from the turf to berate his relieved defence for not attending earlier to the threat.

  The Rovers threatened more as they settled to the task, but it was twenty minutes before the Liverpool goalie made his first save and that was a straightforward one. Liverpool were swifter and more direct, exuding the confidence which came from their position in the league and a succession of good results. The Rovers’ attacks were fitful and not as sustained
as they would have wished. But they defended sturdily, so that there were few clear chances of goals at either end.

  Then, five minutes before the half time interval, disaster struck the home side. The star French winger, for whom Liverpool had paid a transfer fee greater than the cost of all eleven Brunton players, got clear for the first time after a dazzling piece of footwork. He moved swiftly down the Rovers right flank, leaving his full back floundering well behind him. The Rovers centre half moved swiftly to cover him, as his manager had warned him he would have to do at some time in the game. He was outpaced and he knew he was, labouring behind his fleet-footed opponent as he moved into the penalty area. The Frenchman looked up, saw his two strikers free and waiting for a pass twelve yards from goal, and prepared to make an accurate cross. Panting behind him, the Rovers’ defender made a desperate sliding tackle, searching desperately for a touch of the ball, any sort of touch, with his outstretched foot.

  The Gallic boots were too quick for him. The defender failed in his desperate, heroic, futile tackle, missed the ball, and caught the foot of his opponent, who fell theatrically to the turf and rolled over three times with balletic energy. ‘PENALTY!’ roared the visiting horde behind the goal, and they were right, despite the Oscar-worthy exaggerations of the central figure. The outstretched arm of the referee, stark and black as that of the Grim Reaper himself, pointed inexorably to the penalty spot. The Rovers hung their heads; the Liverpool players hauled their man to his feet and hugged him for his efforts.

  Steven Gerrard, the Liverpool icon, as native to the city as Scouse itself or the Liver Building by the Mersey, lined up the penalty, exchanging grim smiles with the Rovers’ keeper: the two had known each other and been friends for ten years and more. No place for friendship, this.

  Stevie G. wouldn’t miss, the men behind the goal told each other, though some of them shut their eyes as he moved to the ball. The roar told those who could not bear to watch that all was well. An unstoppable shot, high and to the goalkeeper’s right, hitting the stanchion which supported the post. Red and white scarves waved in triumphant unison behind the disconsolate goalkeeper; gloomy resignation on the other three sides of the ground where the blue and white favours of Brunton floundered disconsolately.

  A few minutes later, the shaken Brunton team were shut in the dressing room for the half-time interval with Robbie Black, whilst the manager wondered how he was to raise the spirits and the effort of these sweating men who had heard it all before. He did not yell at them: that would risk communicating his own dismay at events thus far. They had been outplayed, but they had given maximum effort, and he would not berate them for that.

  ‘Man for man, you’re as good as they are, for all their fancy prices and their fancy wages. So far, you haven’t combined as well as a team as they have, but you’re going to put that right in the second half. Get it, keep it, pass it! The basics still apply and they always will. But you need to move the ball more quickly. That’s in the hands of those of you who haven’t got the ball. Front men, you must give your midfield men options. The runs you make are important, even when you never get the ball, and you know it. Every time you draw defenders after you, you’re making space for someone else. David will make the passes, if you give him the options.’

  Robbie glanced at his constructive midfield player, the most imaginative passer in his team, who forced a strained smile from his anxious white face. Men were reduced to boys in the extreme tensions of a match like this. Robbie turned back to the rest. ‘Their defence is solid, but there’s room on the wings – there always is. If you can get towards the line and pull crosses back, no defence likes that. You don’t like it. And neither will they. And remember, you’re as good as they are, on your own pitch. You just need to operate as a team and work like hell for each other. Once you’ve pulled them back, they’ll be rattled.’

  He forced conviction into his words, trying to excite himself as well as his players. He had no idea how much effect his words would have. It was a simple game really, and you had to keep your message simple. But that meant that there was always a danger of repeating yourself and losing effect. It was always easier to convince youngsters than the hardened pros who felt they had heard and seen it all before. He had a mixture of the two in this game. He kept his captain and central defender behind as the others trooped out of the dressing room and down the passage to the pitch for the second half. ‘Don’t let the lads over-stretch themselves as we attack, Colin. They’ll punish us if we do.’

  The veteran nodded his assent, grimaced wryly to himself as he followed his team into the tunnel. Attack, but don’t take risks: there was nothing like having your cake and eating it. But the boss was right, of course. The younger lads would get carried away with the prospect of beating Liverpool, if they got a goal.

  The Rovers were better, certainly, as the second forty-five minutes began. They soon had the internationals who composed the Liverpool defence looking anxious for the first time, shouting instructions to each other and beckoning their attacking colleagues to come back and help. Their goalie made his first good save, then the tall Brunton centre forward headed narrowly over the bar. The home crowd, sensing a revival, roared their team on, but for twenty minutes Liverpool kept their lead. It looked as though they had weathered the storm and were ready to reassert themselves as the Rovers tired.

  Then, just when it was needed, the goal came. The ball bounced free in midfield after a stern home tackle. David Greaves pounced and slid a pass along the turf between the Liverpool central defenders. Ashley Greenhalgh was on to it in a flash, moving swiftly towards goal, flicking the ball forward as his marker slid despairingly after him. He steadied himself as the goalkeeper advanced towards him, then slid the ball low and accurately past him into the corner of the net. A massive roar greeted his effort as he wheeled away towards the corner flag and the home support, his right arm raised in triumph towards his followers.

  Now the home team pressed forward, riding on the continuous encouragement of their fans like surfers on an incoming tide, feeling the heady sense of destiny which a win would bring. They had three corners in quick succession, then hit the crossbar with a snap shot from the inspired David Greaves, who was urging them forward with a series of subtle passes.

  Then Robbie Black’s warning to his captain was abruptly justified. Liverpool needed the win rather than the draw to sustain their run for the title, and the Rovers’ assault gave them the room they needed. They broke away swiftly after the third of the Rovers’ corners, and had for a vital moment three attackers against two defenders. The pass from the right wing was well timed. Their leading scorer, cutting in from the left to receive it, met the ball beautifully, so that the visiting fans were up out of their seats to applaud the goal. But the Rovers goalkeeper, moving even as his opponent shot, stretched miraculously to get his flying left hand to the ball when it seemed past him.

  He had the luck which his anticipation and agility deserved. The ball was diverted just enough to hit the goalpost and rebound back into play, whence it was booted out of play with massive relief by the Rovers’ toiling captain. Anguish among the visiting supporters as they sank back into their seats. Cheers for their heroic goalkeeper, then laughter with a strong element of hysteria in it from the Rovers’ faithful at their reprieve.

  The play was more even now, with both sides going for the win. A feeling spread that the tremendous physical efforts which the Rovers’ players had made would tell against them in the closing section of the match. There were fouls on both sides by tiring players, a booking and a severe lecture from the referee to the nineteen-year-old Brunton midfield player whose enthusiasm had strayed into rashness and a desperate tackle on Steven Gerrard.

  Then, with five minutes to play, the unthinkable happened. Ashley Greenhalgh was suddenly free on the right wing, his clever run seen and rewarded by a subtle pass from the man behind him. He cut in towards goal, then veered away again as two men moved to cover his run. He feinted to move
back inside just enough to get the full back on the wrong foot, then dipped his shoulder and moved outside him. As the ball threatened to run away from him over the goal line, he pulled it back along the ground to around the penalty spot, where his centre forward was moving in with the speed and impetus of an express train. With the crescendo of the crowd’s roar in his ears, he smashed the ball unstoppably past the despairing goalkeeper, raised both arms in brief triumph to the exulting crowd, and was then submerged under the frantic congratulations of his team-mates.

  Bobble hats were flung into the air, some of them never to be retrieved. Boys danced the crazy dance of unthinking joy which would never be possible for them again, young men embraced each other in the breathy male camaraderie which would have been impossible anywhere else. Old men with rheumy eyes found that for some reason they could not stop laughing. Robbie Black leapt in manic celebration on the touchline for thirty seconds, then remembered himself, and made frantic gestures of caution towards his excited players as he pointed at his watch. Edward Lanchester, on his feet and cheering in the directors’ box, lost thirty years and clasped first Helen Capstick and then Debbie Black in happy embraces, effortlessly lifting them off their feet in his happiness.

  The referee’s urgent whistling eventually made the Brunton team regroup for the final stages of the drama. Liverpool threw their whole team forward in frantic attack as the minutes ticked away. The crowd groaned when four minutes of stoppage time were announced, the longest and most agonising four minutes that many of them could remember. At the very end, even the Liverpool goalkeeper came up for the final corner kick, but to no avail. This like the other pressure was repulsed. And as the ball arched high away from the home goal, the three long blasts of the whistle announced that the greatest Brunton result of the season was finally secure.