1.6 - Cataclysm

6.

Football glossary: hattrick. Three goals in one match. "He scored a first-half hattrick."

Shambolic. Humiliating. Debacle. Shocking. Hilarious. These were the words being tossed around after just 30 minutes of Manchester United's 4-0 defeat to Brentford.

United's goalkeeper, David de Gea, the highest-paid Spanish footballer in the world with wages of 20 million pounds a year, allowed a one-mile-per-hour shot to dribble through his hands. And that was only the start of the cataclysm.

Brentford's wage bill was one-tenth of United's, and their starting eleven cost a combined £45.5 million. Five of United's players cost more than that on their own, including Lisandro Martinez, a new signing considered (by everyone outside Old Trafford) too short to play centre-back in the Premier League. He was awful, frequently bullied, and unable to cope with Brentford's fast, powerful forwards or their clever set pieces. He looked like the little girl City had sent on near the end of our match - too small, not talented enough, an obvious weak link. Unlike me, Brentford had no qualms about exploiting it.

Brentford's players looked hungrier and more determined, and the stats proved it. As a team they ran 14km (8.7 miles) more than United.

United were trying to pass the ball short from the goalkeeper to attract the Brentford players - just like Man City's girls had done against Beth's team. Except where the 16-year-old girls were using it to trick their much older opponents, United were using it to bring pressure on themselves so they could implode further.

After the 4th goal, when United continued to play in the limp, lethargic, almost suicidal way they had started the game, I joined in the fun and started laughing. Imagine being paid that much money and caring that little. It was hard to know who to be mad at - who to single out. From the players, anyway. The vampiric ownership was a different matter. But let's start with David De Gea. It would take me FIFTEEN YEARS to earn what he took home in ONE WEEK.

And he didn't give a shit. Neither did any of the others.

It was abject, shameful, pitiful, and United rightly finished the weekend bottom of the league.

And soon after, my inbox was flooded - a slight exaggeration - with offers of tickets to the next game from disgusted, furious supporters. I snapped one up and drove to the guy's house to get it before he changed his mind. 60 pounds! Not cheap, and I had to listen to a ten-minute rant about how shit all the players were. True. But I had a ticket!

I didn't really want to watch United get pissed on by their old rivals, Liverpool, one of the 3 best teams in the world. But at least I personally would get something out of it. Most likely I'd be the only United fan in the stadium who could say that! One way or another, I'd learn more about this curse. One way or another, I’d get some very, very definitive answers.

***

Although I was looking forward to the match in a fatalistic kind of way, football wasn't currently my favourite thing in the world. When I thought about it, my mind always turned to the stupendous amounts of money being squandered. United would hire a manager, spend two hundred million pounds buying him the players he wanted, then sack him and start the process again with a new guy who didn't rate the old players. So the players bought in the previous cycle, and the one before that, were on the bench or in the reserves earning unthinkable wages, their short careers going nowhere.

As a United fan in the old days, even when they were having a bad run you could expect them to go and buy someone else's best player and solve the problem that way. When Leeds won the league United bought Eric Cantona from them. Leeds stopped winning; United shot into the distance. Years later, Newcastle started to challenge United, so United bought Andy Cole, Newcastle's star striker. United won the treble. Years later, United came second on goal difference so they bought Robin Van Persie from Arsenal, and he scored a ton as United cruised to the title. Ah, the good old days. I wish I'd seen them.

But now the rampant spending was fuelling the problem, not fixing it. They bought Pogba but didn't know what to do with him. They bought Di Maria and had no place for him in the team. They bought Ronaldo, and the team became hashtag content for his Instagram feed.

Millions and millions of pounds flying out of the club, left, right and centre. A torrent of cash and incompetence. Hilarious to fans of other teams, fair enough, but for someone making 1400 pounds a month it was all hard to take.

And that's partly why instead of watching Chelsea vs Spurs, or going to Hough End to get XP, I went to the care home. Mum and Anna were watching Flog It! - a TV show where people bring antiques to be valued. (What price Ronaldo?) I drew a chair and sat next to them in depressed silence, so much so that Solly the Psychic Dog took pity on me and sat on my feet.

"You're sad," declared Anna. "You should take him for a walk."

"That's what I'd do if he was sad," I said.

"It works both ways," she said. "His leash is on the side table."

***

We trudged the streets. I was in some sort of delayed shock from the match. 4-0! This was probably how they felt in Rome when they heard Hannibal had wiped out the Legions. Just loads of people walking around not saying anything, not believing their own reality, not knowing where they were.

Solly knew where he was, and he started pulling me towards a big park. There, we wandered from tree to tree and bush to bush. He seemed to be having a great time. And his jolly little tail wag and the hot sunshine and the cool shade started to cheer me up. I started to think about more optimistic topics than Man United's future: global heating; rampant inflation; the imminent collapse of liberal democracy.

A woman with a dog of her own stopped for an encounter. "Oh, he's so cute! What's his name?"

It took me a second to snap back into my body. The woman had bent and was giving Solly an aggressive cheek rub. "Solly."

"What is he?"

"A Tennessee Subcritical," I said. Solly and the other dog were sniffing each other very intently. It was pretty graphic. Shouldn’t be allowed in public.

The dog owner frowned, but then looked up at me like I was George Clooney - big eyes open wide, enjoying being teased. "There's no such thing."

"I don't know what he is. He's from another patient. I'm just walking him."

She laughed. "I knew it. Hot guy with a cute dog, round here of all places. Of course you're sick. Irreversibly damaged, no doubt. How long have you got left to live?"

"About three nights."

“Is there no cure?"

I was thinking of something funny to say. Some witty comeback. But why? I was already in. “Let’s drop him off and then you can invite me to your place.”

***

Solly helped me take my mind off things, it's fair to say. I took him for a 'walk' the next night, too, with similar results. Solly was a total assist machine. I thought about going for the hattrick, but putting it like that made it seem tawdry, so I skipped a day. The day after was Thursday and while walking him, a total cutie pie started chatting me up. But Solly didn't like her. He kept trying to hide behind me, doing tiny whines, all those things dogs do when they're scared.

You're probably thinking I ignored him and took a shot at an open goal.

No chance. I don't believe in the paranormal - except Scottish curses - but I'm not a complete idiot. At least, I hope not. I let the woman down gently and found a stick to throw for the dog. The smooth-brained idiot loved it.

***

Random note: I went past the little park near my house a few times and finally saw the kid who'd helped me get home. He was mid-game and didn't notice me. I did a little shop at the big ASDA and on the way back I waved him over.

"Mate," I said, trying to press a pack of hobnobs into his hands. "Thanks for helping me home that time. I was pretty out of it."

"Say that again."

"But I should have given you the biscuits."

"Nah, man. I was joking." He tried to push the hobnobs back into my plastic bag.

"Nah, you could have left me there on the ground and that. I'm just saying thanks."

He took the pack, just to shut me up. "Aight, sorted." He looked at the game that was continuing without him. He was itching to get back to it.

"One thing, though. I have a kind of half-memory of something you said. I've been wracking my brains trying to work it out."

"What's that?"

"It was... it was something about 'good deeds' but there was 'punished' as well. It made no sense."

He sort of sneered at me, but then he remembered. He clicked his tongue. "No good deed goes unpunished, man. You never heard that?"

"I don't think so. What's it mean?"

"Means you do something good, you get banged. So why bovver?"

I rubbed the side of my head. I could have popped a balloon with all the static. "That's not how it goes, is it? You helped me out, you got a pack of hobnobs. That's like one pound fifty of top quality choc."

The kid said 'tsk' and started to walk away. "I dunno man. I leave the philosophising to the taxi drivers."

In other words: don't think too much.

The strange thing was, I took his advice. He was an ugly street kid, one I used to avoid like the plague, but here he was pouring out single-malt shots of wisdom. I had a real special power and its name was Solly. I stopped trying to understand my new augmented reality. I stopped worrying about the curse and what it all meant. My attention shifted back towards the stats that mattered - the stats that would get me paid. The call centre. Helping real people with real problems. Making my boss happy. Making sure my name was mentioned at promotion time. Maybe not this year, but the year after.

I decided to leave the exploring to the explorers and the data analysis to the podcast nerds. Anything more was pure delusion.

I slept like a baby for a few nights. I slept in a room that smelled of dog for a few nights. Life was tolerable.

But then it was Monday, 22nd August, the day Manchester United played Liverpool. And that's when I knew my days in the call centre were numbered. Because what I saw that evening was fundamental to everything that followed.