1.27 - Champion Manager

27.

The rest of the evening was a laugh. Totally enjoyable, especially once we started mingling and I got to know Lula and Freyja a bit better. Seeing a couple of the women leave early to put their kids to bed was an eye-opener. Kids and university? And two evenings a week playing footy? How to Make Me Feel Like a Sloth, volume 1.

The only really significant thing happened when Ziggy went to the toilet. Actually, he said he was going there but he somehow ended up merging with one of the groups of ladies standing around a column. I'm pretty sure, but not definite, that I heard him asking what their favourite chant was.

Stealing my material! The dog.

Anyway, while he was gone, I asked Jackie what was going on with Ziggy.

He pretended not to know what I meant and said Ziggy had come to a couple more training sessions. In the first sesh, the one I'd been at, the other lads had liked him. In the second, they started to ask questions. Why is this guy here again? He's shit. He's messing up the drills. In the third, same again.

"Why did you ask him back if he's shit?" said Beth.

Jackie pointed at me.

"What?"

"Max has unshakeable belief in Ziggy. Either he's a lunatic or a genius. At first glance, I would have said Max was a talentless nobody who'd lied about his Monarchist tendencies to get in with some working-class men who should know better." Shit! He knew! "But then I saw him play, and then I saw him organise a team in a minute flat and get a tune out of Frogger that no-one has for years."

"Frogger?" I said.

"Gribbin." He enjoyed my blank face, because it let him explain. "Ribbit, Ribbit. Gribbin, Gribbin."

"Oh," I said. "Frogger."

"So what's the harm in letting the kid come to some training sessions? The total destruction of team morale, yeah, sure. But I persuaded Neil to see how it plays out."

"Neil is the manager?" said Beth. "And he lets you do weird little experiments, does he?"

"Yep," said Jackie, just with a hint of smugness, which if you think about it is the most smug you can be. He looked over towards where Ziggy had been. He'd actually gone to the toilet, it seemed. "Max. How good do you think Ziggy can get?"

I wasn't totally sure. But if becoming a Premier League player required a CA of 150 - citation needed! - and in the 7th tier, FC United's guys averaged 35-40... "He can play in the next division up. What's that called, the National League North? Could he make it in the one above that? I think so, but more as a goalscoring supersub. A fox in the box for the ends of games. Not sure about as a first-team starter in the 5th tier. I think I'd prefer to see him in the 6th tier banging in 15 goals a season, and having one legendary year where he scores 25 in the league and a hattrick against Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup."

Another tiny silence. I didn't notice these silences happening when other people talked. What was it about me?

Jackie repressed a grin, but his eyebrows gave the game away. He was amused. "Beth, your boyfriend is extremely precise."

Beth leant her head onto my shoulder. "He’s not my boyfriend. I just use him for sex."

She couldn't have said anything that sounded sweeter to my ears. I gave her a cuddle-squeeze, checked Ziggy wasn't around, and turned back to Jackie. "So my client. Are you going to give him a contract or what?"

Jackie was still grinning at Beth, but there was some flicker in his expression, and when the moment passed, his grin seemed fake. He looked down at his beer. "Well, Max. If we gave him a contract today, would you see him playing against Warrington? Or the week after against Marine?"

I felt my chin pop backwards like I'd been given a tiny jab. That sort of disbelieving reaction when you're so shocked you need to move your brain away from the conversation for its own safety. "What are you talking about? He's nowhere near ready. But if you keep letting him train he will be. Maybe by January." Three months of training and maybe Ziggy's CA could increase to... what? 20? I thought about what that would mean. "In January there'll be tons of clubs looking for a striker, even one who can only play 30 minutes a game. We'll definitely get him a club. And they'll be the ones benefiting from your coaching. You should tie him up now. And next season? Boom. Prolific. Get him in an 18-month deal and you'll be laughing."

Jackie was staring at me, expressionless. He'd forgotten to press refresh on his fake smile. "Leave him with us for a couple more weeks," he said, blandly.

Ominous as fuck.

***

By the end of the evening I was pretty darn tipsy, so I don't remember some of what happened. I certainly can't explain what happened that Friday.

Housekeeping note - On Thursday I went to Platt Fields to chat to Emre. Since I was falling into debt left, right, and centre, what was a few more pounds? I asked if I could get a wrap and pay him back. He rolled his eyes and was about to refuse when he thought better of it. "No onions," I said. "I don't deserve them yet." Onions are for winners!

So I had a good chat about Fatih Terim, maybe the best ever Turkish football manager. Apparently, there was a Netflix documentary about him, which Emre delighted in spoiling over the course of twenty hilarious, expletive-filled minutes. When I escaped, I picked up 55 XP watching some games.

So, back to Friday. The Met Heads were playing the team below them in the league. I didn't expect it to be much of a challenge. The plan was to get a couple of goals ahead and then start trying out some tactical plans we could use against City.

But when I got there, Jackie and Ziggy were waiting. Ziggy, obvs, was into one of the team and was here for his own nefarious reasons. But Jackie? What could he possibly get out of it?

For the first ten minutes, I stood on the sidelines, bossing the women around as I so enjoyed doing. We took a 2-0 lead, but the other team scored right away, so I couldn't start dicking around just yet. Frustrating.

Jackie had seen enough to start quizzing me.

"Why is Beth in defence?"

"Because she's a defender."

Pause.

Jackie: "She's the fittest."

"No she isn't." That was Ziggy. In Manchester, fit means sexy.

Jackie: "Do you need a cold shower, Ziggy lad? Max, she's the fittest so you should put her in midfield and let her do all the pressing."

Me: "We're not going to press City. We're just going to pretend."

"What."

"I'm going to let them have the whole midfield."

"Tommy Tactics has finally lost his marbles."

"I'm going to play 2-2-2 but without the 2."

Jackie laughed and slapped his leg. "I knew it! I knew this was going to be wild."

***

But the guys turning up to watch me collect 100 XP from the Met Heads wasn't even the weirdest thing that happened that weekend.

The next morning, Beth called me. She never called, always texted. "What?" I said, still groggy from the post-match drinks. Why did people think it was worth giving up their savings to see me drunk?

"It's 9:30. You said to meet you there at 10. I'm just checking you're up."

"I'm up, I'm up. Wait, what?"

Turns out, at some point I'd drunkenly told Beth about Solly the Psychic dog and that I wanted to 'get her tested'. She had been keen, because she had always suspected I had invented the story of my mother being in a hospice to get out of dates. When she was telling me all this in the car, I had a vague memory of her complaining that I had been 'Dennis Systeming' her. Apparently in some TV show a character called Dennis invented a sick relative to manipulate women.

Imagine accusing me of that.

I pulled up to the care home at half ten. Beth tapped one last message on her phone and got out. "It says care home, Max."

"Yep. Does what it says on the tin."

"You've been telling me it's a hospice."

Oh. Right. "Slip of the tongue. Let's get this over with. Chat with mum first, then dog."

That's when the morning got even more surreal. In the reception area, Jackie and Ziggy were reading celebrity gossip magazines. It was possibly the single most shocking moment of my life, including the time I saw numbers floating above Stephen McGough's head and the day a neighbour came home in his new car - a surplus army tank.

There's no point describing the whole morning, but Ziggy was polite, Jackie was extremely charming, and my mum was enchanted by Beth. We had tea and dry, old-person biscuits, including those ones with the jam hearts. What's the point of them?

The only sour moment came when we’d all just started on our second cup of tea. That was when mum's level of lucidity increased to the point where she realised she had no clue who any of these people were.

"How do you all know Max?"

"Through football," said Beth, whose accent was a little more refined than usual. She was so weird. "He's actually helping us with our team. We're going to play Manchester City next week."

"Oh, he loves his football," said my mum, and there were smiles all round. "He was always in his room, playing the football game. Hours, he'd play it. I could never see the attraction."

This was alarming. While she seemed superficially healthy, suddenly I was forced to reevaluate. Did she look tired around the eyes? Were her hands shaking more?

"What game?" asked Ziggy, and I tried to give him a warning look, but he was busy nibbling the edges of his biscuit, trying to eat the maximum amount without getting any jam in him.

"Oh, I never remember the names. He'd play it all day. Carlisle United! I remember that. He was always Carlisle. Said it wasn't a challenge being Manchester United."

"Oh," said Ziggy, beaming at her. "Champion Manager!"

"That sounds right," she said.

I couldn't believe my ears. She was delusional. Making up stories. I needed to talk to a doctor about it but there were all these people here and I couldn't leave them alone with her in case they made it worse. I stood, forcefully, indicating that this conversation was over.

Beth, incredibly, infuriatingly, persisted. "You played Champion Manager, Max? That explains a lot. Why you know tactics and things."

I wandered behind my mum's back and made savage gestures trying to get her to stop. "Ha ha," I said. Then mimed slitting my throat. Why couldn't they just get the message?

Mum chuckled at some fictional memory. She reached her hand over her shoulder and I was forced to take it. Not that I minded, really, but it limited the body language I could employ. "I remember he cracked the computer, or however you say those computer things. So that he could put himself in the game. Why did it say Max Best scored a goal, I asked him. I'm the Player-Manager, he said! He put himself in the game." She patted my hand a few times. Proud. Proud of this thing that never happened.

Jackie leaned back. "Let me guess. Passing 20. Technique 20."

Beth looked as innocent as an angel as she said, "Endurance 20. Goes all night. I mean, match." Ziggy managed to suppress a huge laugh.

But this wasn't funny. And why were they using a scale out of 20? That was a weird coincidence. I hated every second of this conversation. I felt like I was being crushed, like the air was being pushed out of my lungs. With one last, huge effort, I smiled and placed mum's hand back on her lap. "Maybe that's right. But I think that's enough talk about football now. Mum needs her rest. Let's go and see Anna."

With a lot of very confused and bewildered looks, the guys got up, left their barely-touched teas on the side, said bye to my mum, and walked out.

In the corridor, Beth challenged me. "What the fuck, Max!"

I looked around and dragged her through a doorway and into a corridor where we could bicker without disturbing the patients. "What the fuck, Beth! What the fuck, Jackie!"

"What?"

"What was all that shit?"

"Let's try calming all the fucking way down, Maxy boy. Take a breath."

I didn't react well to that at first, but then I supposed he might have a point. I walked away from them, put my hands on my head, and returned. "My mother is very sick, okay? She has mental problems. What you heard in there was a complete fabrication. A work of fiction. Okay? And you were just encouraging her."

Beth and Jackie exchanged glances. Beth said, "Are you saying you never played Champion Manager?"

"I've never even heard of it. What the fuck is Champion Manager?"

Ziggy was tapping on his phone. Jackie said, "It's the most famous football game. You run a football team. Buy and sell players. Set the tactics. Give the half-time team talk."

I stared at him like he had, I don't know, eight heads. Ziggy pushed his phone towards me. I saw the google image search results for 'champion manager'.

The first picture looked like a database. A spreadsheet, maybe. But the cells were all written in something like Korean. Or that kind of space-asian font you get in cool sci-fi. Another picture showed a series of blocks with the same font inside. Another one did look vaguely familiar, but again, it was just squiggles and runes and shit.

"This is a game?"

"Wait," said Ziggy. "I can never tell if you're joking. Are you seriously saying you've never heard of Champion Manager?"

I looked at him with a sense of exponentially rising desperation. I felt like I'd be trapped in this conversation for the rest of my life. Just an endless circle of these three telling me I had to know this game - were you supposed to memorise what the squiggles meant? - and me trying to tell them, show them, make them understand.

THAT I HAD NEVER HEARD OF THE FUCKING THING.

"All right," said Jackie. He took the jammy biscuit out of my hand and popped the crushed mess into a nearby bin. "All right. We're sorry we stressed your mum. It must be hard on you."

"Yeah," said Beth, going along to get along. "Soz."

"We were trying to be nice," said Ziggy.

I blinked. "Of course you were," I said. "Of course you were." The crisis was over. I took a deep breath. "Right. Good. So..." I slapped my hands together, trying to summon up a cloud of pally positivity. I tried to remember why they were here. Not to talk about impossible, irrational things, that was for sure. "Let's go meet a psychic dog."