African Tears

A Right Bandit · November 26, 2004

It's 2 AM, the phone rings. I wearily pick it up "Is that Dan Stone?" the voice asks "yes it is, who the hell is this at this hour?" I demand.

The events of the next ten minutes go by in a flash but the gist of it is this: the entire management team at Nottingham Forest have been shot dead by dwarves on safari and i, Dan Stone - a mere office worker at The City Ground, have been chosen to become the next manager. This is due to a series of financial problems that prohibit the board from contracting out an established manager. I argued back and forth that I had no background in football and that I would be laughed out of the training ground, but the chairman stood firm. He told me in no uncertain terms that if i didnt accept the job that he knew some very bad people that would come and "make a ****" on my carpet. Well, what could i do? It was a brand new carpet, and i couldnt afford to get it cleaned, never mind replaced.

So I turn up for my first day at Nottingham Forest F.C as the manager, and the players are very suspicious of me. Gareth Taylor, the established Welsh front-man, ran me over in his mini metro. The players just laughed. My pride was hurt of course but I didnt let it show. Instead, I decided to take the hard line, "i'll be a disciplinarian" I thought. I phoned Gareth Taylors parents and told them what had happened. I'm not sure what action they took but this incident was never repeated!

The next few weeks of training and pre-season friendlies flew by and as I gradually earned the players respect I began to get a feel for the team. Marlon King and David Johnson were a potent front two, and I had a couple of electric paced wingers in Andy Reid and Andy Impey. But the team was missing something. An attacking midfielder who could play in the 'hole' was needed if we were to be ready for our opening game against Q.P.R. I instructed my chief scout - to search every Tesco store in the country to find this elusive player "sod off". Came the reply from my scout. "I'm watching Magnet & Steel", I shook my head at him "look, Higgins" I shouted, "get the hell out on the road. I know there's a Tesco employee out there who can tear this division apart, now get looking or you're out". Andy Higgins got his fat arse up off the sofa and begun his journey.

I took his place on the couch and started watching the episode of Magnet & Steel, it was very good. The double act had come across a bad guy in a warehouse shouting "I'm evil" and Magnet had to get in a tank. Great stuff!

I didnt hear much from andy higgins for a while, and when i did I wasn't impressed with what I saw, a few cloggers with good stamina but no real talent - the gary neville type. Until one day. Higgins phoned me up. He was in high spirits and did a spot-on impression of the cheeky girls "cheeky cheeky!" he quipped, anyway he had reason to be pleased with himself. He'd been in Cheltenham and discovered a boy-genius called Ryan Baker, who was perfect for the playmaker role. "before you get too excited boss, this kid's got a few problems." I wasnt too worried "oh thats alright fatty, we've got some good physios here, he'll be 100% in no time". there was a silence ."erm, no boss. It's not fitness problems. He's erm... a bit of a racist." I was devastated. Theres no way I could associate this fine club with racism. I thought long and hard and eventually came up with a solution - I'll do all his interviews for him!" the press will never know.

I made the decision and signed up Baker, he signed his contract - 'Adolf Hitler', so we had to get another one drawn up. It was at this point i realised we could never allow him to sign autographs for fans.

The local press wanted to know all about this wonder kid from Tesco, so I had to oblige them. I did ever single interview on his behalf. In one radio interview i was asked "how good this kid is" and i made the bold claim that he was on a par with Pele, Maradona, Chris Bart-Williams and George Best. Maybe i shouldn't have put so much pressure on the lad but i was genuinly excited about seeing him turn out against Q.P.R at the weekend.

Saturday came and the pre-match buzz was catching like wildfire. I named my eleven - Gerrard, Louis-Jean, Rogers, Dawson, Tarka, Evans, Beaumont, Reid, Impey, King, Johnson.

Baker was disapointed to start on the bench but i told him i wanted to see how the game developed and then introduce him to use the element of surprise. I gave my team talk. I spoke about the film Home Alone 2 and about how poor Macauley Culkin was lost in New York. "DO IT FOR CULKIN!!!!!" were my last inspiring words as the lads left the dressing room. We all walked out into the tunnel and onto the pitch except Barker. This didnt bother me, I assumed he was just psyching himself up for his debut. I went and sat in the dugout and the game soon kicked off. We started brightly, probing for openings and testing their keeper from distance. The home fans were getting right behind us when King went through one on one and tucked it away in the far corner. YES! Great start. Right, lets try and hold onto this now, i thought.

All of a sudden the 30,000 crowd went silent. I looked around me "whats going on?" I thought. All of a sudden I saw it - the sight of Ryan Baker making his way from the tunnel to the dugout, dressed head to toe as a Ku-Klux Klan member. White robes, the lot. I couldn't believe it. I sunk my head in my hands. The entire crowd werent even watching the game any more. Their heads follwed this strange white suited figure in silence all the way to the subs bench. He sat down next to me and removed his hood. "alright boss?" he grinned.

I was in a daze. All I could do was get him on quick. I told the 4th official to put James Beaumont's number up. "you're going on Baker, get out of that ridiculous outfit. And don't let me see you wearing it again." He got stripped off and warmed up.

Beaumont was gutted to come off so early in the 1st game of the season. He blanked me as he left the pitch. Baker sprinted on. He surprised everyone in the ground by making his first tackle on a player who didn't even have the ball. It was over the top and two footed. Even worse, it was on his own player - Andy Impey. Ryan celebrated by giving the Nazi salute. I shouted for Micheal Dawson to go and have a word with him. Michael did so and Ryan seemed to calm down.

5 minutes from half time, a long ball from Alan Rogers was coming Ryan's way. He watched it come down and elegantly killed it first time with his left foot. He feinted to lob it over the top for Johnson, but instead sent Reid away on the overlap. Reid flew towards the touchline and knocked over a great cross with pace. The keeper came out and punched it to the edge of the box. Baker was waiting. He controlled it on his chest before firing a rocket into the top corner. He was ecstatic and wheeled away to the corner flag with his shirt over his head like Ravanelli, revealing the letters 'B.N.P' tattooed across his chest.

Marlon King, David Johnson and Andy Impey were understandably appalled by this debut performance and refused to go and celebrate with him.

I was facing a huge dilemma. The boy seems to be a troubled genius. I could try explaining to him about how down in Sowetto there's a child who thinks a landmine is a ball? I was at my wits end.....

A Right Bandit · November 26, 2004