1.70 - Planting Seeds

70.

Mike Dean had a good time, by his standards a legendary night on the tiles, until it was home o'clock, at which point he realised he'd have to spend the night in Moss Side. You'd think that would sober him up, but no. Even though I had the dodgy ankle, it fell to me to help him back to my place. When he found out there was only one bed I worried he'd burst into tears, so I let him take it.

Down in my living room, I took the two cushions from my sofa and tried to create a sort of mattress from them. That didn't go well, and I ended up lying on my back with my right leg resting on the sofa, eyes closed but wide awake, until 5 am when MD woke up and got dressed. He left, groggy, to find his car, and I thought I'd slip into the bed and get a few hours kip. It was a bit moist from Mike's beer sweats, so I threw all the bedding into the machine and abandoned all hope of sleep.

Fortunately, I had a lot to think about. In a way, the calculation was simple. Mike would give me a job at Chester if he could, and I'd take it if people would listen to me.

I'd take it if... Where had that if come from?

I should take any job they'd give me and bide my time until a better opportunity came my way. So what if parts of the job would be frustrating? If I worked for Chester for a year, that would make me much more attractive to some other club. I'd have a year of experience! And Jesus Christ, Max. Being frustrated by your job in a football club was a million times better than being frustrated working in a bank. Get a grip!

So yeah. I'd go and watch Chester vs Oldham, and I'd be open-minded about what Mike was proposing. Barriers, obstacles, potential problems - so what? Being ignored by Ian Evans? Being laughed at by the coaches? Being the loser in the battle with the Bulldog Brothers? Lying there on my pitch-black living room floor, waiting for the day to start, wishing I owned a hundred pound IKEA sofa bed or even just a sleeping bag - yeah. I could take whatever shit the footballing world had to throw at me.

Absolutely I could.

By the way, Mike Dean snores.

***

Before work, I spent a while sending out texts. Better late than never!

I started with Jackie, thanking him for giving Ziggy a chance. I asked Ziggy how he was feeling. I sent Kisi, Raffi, and Emma a still image of Ziggy going wild. I sent Henri Lyons a string of heart emojis. I messaged Bill Brown, my contact at Oldham, saying I'd be seeing his team play again and if he was going to Chester would he join me for a quick pint? I texted the ginger one from Charlie's Angels asking her to let me know if either of her friends wanted to see Mike Dean again. (She never replied.)

At lunch, I asked Raffi to call me. We talked about the ideal day for him to pop down to Chester and show his stuff. I told him that he should work on his fitness as though he'd signed a pre-contract because one way or another, it was going to happen. He said he'd been doing his old boxing routines and was already feeling a lot trimmer. I mentioned that I'd asked Ziggy to jump on his bed to improve his jumping skill and there was a long silence. "I'm not joking," I said. And he said, "I know. That's what worries me."

I finished my shift with a few lovely chats with African customers and one surprisingly fascinating chat with an elderly English lady who had been raised as a strict Anglican but now, as she aged, wondered if it had all been worth it.

In the context of me trying to get James Yalley to play football, these chats were fascinating. Absolutely riveting. But had I sat in a church on a Sunday morning and had the same conversations, I would have been bored to bits.

I logged off and drove straight to Chester. I got to the stadium before Mike Dean and parked in his spot.

If he complained, our deal was off.

The dude owed me.

***

Chester FC. The Deva Stadium. Capacity 6,500. Attendance on the night: just under 4,000. The competition? The FA Cup 4th Qualifying Round. The prize for winning? Progress through to the FA Cup First Round. The third round came with the potential for a match against one of the biggest teams in the world. Huge prestige, huge excitement, and a huge influx of cash.

The Directors’ Box. The best seats in the entire stadium, except (in my opinion) for the manager's dugout. The best view, the best grub: Belgian beer on tap, British cheese by the wheel, French wine by the jeroboam. Plus American cinema-style comfy chairs, Austrian soundproofed windows for those more serious chats, Italian 3-ply toilet rolls. It was very nice.

Annoyingly, I wasn't alone with MD. There was space for about 20 in there, and the place was packed with people who had their own Wikipedia pages. But I eventually realised this was MD's plan. A chance for me to meet some movers and shakers, some of the big names in Chester and the trust that owned the club. I experienced a flash of annoyance - why couldn't MD have told me? I might have rented a suit, or at least worn my work clothes instead of a Sports Direct hoodie. But then again, I was hardly blameless on the 'not telling people my plans' score. And maybe him dropping me into this unexpected social situation was his revenge for me merging our duo with Charlie's Angels, which was my revenge for him laughing when I thought I was getting the Director of Football job.

Truly, if you go looking for revenge you should dig two graves, I thought to myself as I sipped from a bottle of wine that cost more than all the clothes I was wearing.

Anyhow, I turned up the charm with most of the bigwigs. There were a few big business type dudes: sponsors or potential sponsors I guess. With them I achieved 'charm' by flirting with their wives. Not even flirting, really. Just saying things like 'If I move to Chester, promise you'll tell me where you get your hair done'. Just inane shit like that. Bit of attention. They love it.

The guests of honour were a couple of former players wearing retro kits. They called themselves Smasho and Nice One, and that's what it said on the backs of their shirts. Consistent branding! The three of us really got into the weeds, discussing tactics, the recent changes in the offside and handball rules, Messi vs Ronaldo, and VAR - the video assistant referee that was saving football/destroying football, delete as appropriate. Great fun! I guess they were normally bored to tears in this type of gathering and were ecstatic to find someone who spoke their language. When Mike came to join the group, they took the piss out of him for having an opinion. Well, I put a stop to that sharpish. Stern face. No messing. "I'd rather talk to Mike about footy than 99% of the people in this country. Most pricks think they know everything. Mike knows he doesn't. So when he does have an opinion, I find it's worth listening to." And I stared them out. Well, it killed the mood for about 5 seconds, but they relented. One agreed with me and the other said he'd never thought about it like that. And I wasn't just blowing smoke up MD's arse, either. I really meant it. If I went round pretending to be an expert in the pharma industry, I'd expect to be mocked by the actual experts, too.

Mike was pleased, I think, but forced me to mingle.

One of the guys was the mayor, but his job was to be in the photos. No-one wanted to actually talk to him.

There were five or six people from City Fans United. Basically normal people chosen at random to be in the big box for Chester's biggest game of the year. They 'kept themselves to themselves', as we say in Britain. I guess they felt a bit out of place. I tried to talk to them but Mike kept steering me away. Probably some internal politics.

Speaking of...

Mike introduced me to this guy. Let's call him 'Politician 1'. If you held a gun to my head and said 'tell me his name' - I wouldn't. It'd be like naming a tumour. The guy gave me very sinister vibes right from the start, before I even knew he was the local MP. He was the person in the room most attuned to status, I think, and he was fascinated by me. Everyone else was, apart from the trustees, the cream of the crop. Chester's economic, cultural, or football elite. So who the fuck was I? The mystery fascinated him, and he rightly assumed that I was a coming power that he should get to know. But my hairs stood on end as soon as I saw him, and when he tried to talk to me I just felt... I just felt urgh.

[The previous sentence has been nominated for Sentence of the Year. Please vote.]

"Hi, I'm Politician 1," he said, holding out his hand.

I shook it because there are norms in society, but holy fuck I'd have sawn my hand off instead had there been a suitable tool. "Max Best," I said.

"I'm the MP for the City of Chester," he said. "I haven't seen you around before?"

It was a transparent attempt to make me defend my presence and thus reveal who I was. Did that work on people? I stared into his soul, and saw he didn't have one. "What's your stance on wave machines in the English Channel?" I said.

He reacted like I'd announced my intention to shoot his knee caps off. "Er... I'm against it. I'm in the Labour Party."

"Right," I said. Bland. Unsmiling.

The interaction unnerved him. "That's the other lot," he said, and he scuttled away.

The ex-pros, if they'd been put out by my defence of Mike Dean were all the way back on my side. "Well played, Max!" said Nice One. "Good riddance," said Smasho. "That guy creeps me out."

And now that I'd mingled and exorcised our demon, we could start talking shit again. "Who'd win," I pondered, "the Chester team that you played in, or this one?"

***

Fun fun fun.

Cheese wine kittensoft toilet roll.

It was like a Christmas party... until the match kicked off.

The jolly, upbeat, hopeful mood didn't survive a quarter of an hour. By the time of the first goal, I'd already told MD and the ex-pros about the formations (4-4-2 on both teams), the mentality (defensive on both teams), the likely winner (Oldham), the most likely goalscorer (Fondop), and more importantly, the likely entertainment value (close to nil). Smasho and Nice One had a much higher opinion of Ian Evans and we had a bit of a bicker about it.

Oldham's Ben Tollitt scored an unreal goal after 10 minutes and that seemed to confirm what I knew and the others feared - the away team was superior and Chester's FA Cup dreams were over before they even really began. Smasho and Nice One weren't so keen to defend Evans after that. Reader, I felt like a smug twat. Sorry not sorry. But actually, sorry a little bit.

Twenty minutes in, MD took me to the side and asked if I'd thought about what he'd said about being an outside insider. I said I had, non-stop, but nights like this were so frustrating. Ian Evans could tweak sooo many little things but he didn't. If the manager never changed anything, what did that say about the culture of the club? How would I fit in? And he said he knew, he knew, and pottered over to schmooze some rich people.

Half an hour in, MD came back. I softened my stance. "Me as DoF is a long way off, sure, but there are seeds we can plant. But I don't want to plant them if you-know-who is going to be in charge of the tractor." He said my metaphor was confusing him and he reminded me that he hadn't had much sleep. So I clarified. "Hire me as a full-time scout. I'll find you loads of good players. Cheshire and North Wales must be full of hidden gems. We can bring in a shitload of quality prospects. It won't cost much, but they won't be ready until next season or the one after that. So the next manager needs to be one who'll use them. Yeah?" MD said great, sure, but what about this season? And I suggested Chester sign Henri Lyons and he tutted like I was teasing him and went to make sure everyone had enough booze. I noted that he wasn't drinking himself. Sensible.

40 minutes in, he was muttering in my ear again. Was I serious about Henri Lyons? Was he good enough to make a difference? "Yes," I said. "He's way better than what you've got. The only question is, if you sign him, will Evans pick him?" It wasn't the only question. There were millions of other questions. But that was a good one to start with. "We'll have to introduce them," mused MD. "See how they get on." Fair enough.

At half-time I left the box to find Bill, the hospitality guy from Oldham. We had a five-minute chat. That was enough to delight him. Plus he was disposed to be delighted because his team were playing well. He was happy to see I was 'finding my feet'. He was referencing the progression from the tiny 'VIP' box he'd sat me in to an actual Directors’ Box. Yeah. It was progress, wasn't it?

"What ah..." He was trying to frame the question in a discreet way. "What are you in there for? I mean, if it's not too personal."

"Career opportunities," I said, with a smile that meant the conversation was not necessarily over.

He grinned. "What do you hope to get out of this evening? A job offer?"

"Honestly, Bill, I'd be happy with a job description."

He did an intelligent sort of frown, trying to assemble an entire backstory based on the little info I'd given him. The buzz of the crowd increased - the players were coming back out.

I wished him luck for the second half.

***

Before going back into the box, I found a quiet corner to hide in. I needed to collect my thoughts.

Seeing Ian Evans and his absolute refusal to make the smallest tactical changes was really hard to stomach. Could I deal with that twice a week until the summer of 2023? Of course I could. Every time I had doubts, I recalled the discomfort and boredom of the night before.

I took some deep breaths, and steeled myself. I wanted a job.

Steeled as I was, I don't think anything could have prepared me for what came next.