David Peace - The Damned Utd

‘I’ve read the fixture list,’ says Bremner. ‘I know what I’m missing.’

‘That’s another eight games,’ I tell him. ‘Top of the three you’ve missed already. Eleven bloody matches all told.’

He takes another one of my cigs. He takes another glass of my whisky.

‘I’ve told you before,’ I tell him again, ‘if I had to pick any member of the first-team squad here at Leeds to miss games through suspension, the last name on that list — and even then, way behind any other name on that list — would be yours. Clarkey, Giles, Peter Lorimer, Norman Hunter; anybody but you. There’s not another bloody player in this whole fucking club we could possibly miss more than you.’

Bremner puts out his cig. Bremner finishes his drink. ‘Is that all?’

‘Sit down,’ I tell him. ‘Sit down and listen, will you?’

Bremner sits back down. Bremner stares back across my desk.

‘Like I’ve told you before,’ I tell him again, ‘I don’t want to lose you on the field but, if I must lose you on the field, I don’t want to lose you off the field. Now I’m not going to ask you to travel with us to away games, not unless you want to, but what I am going to ask you to consider is coming to the Central League home games, watching the reserves for me, giving me an extra pair of eyes.’

Bremner doesn’t speak. Bremner just stares back across my desk.

‘So instead of travelling to Maine Road with us this coming Saturday,’ I continue, ‘you’d be here watching the reserves play Bolton. If nothing else, it’ll be good experience for you, especially if, as I hear it, you’re thinking of going into management.’

Bremner doesn’t speak. Bremner just stares –

Into my eyes. Into the silence .

Then the door opens again. No knock. Just John Giles standing in the doorway –

‘Thousand apologies,’ he laughs. ‘Not interrupting, am I?’

Bremner stands up. Bremner asks, ‘Can I go now, sir?’

* * *

You and Peter push your way out to your club car in the space reserved for the club manager and then you drive through the press and the television, through the pens and the microphones, the cameras and the lights, past the group of night-shift workers from Rolls-Royce who bang on the roof of your grey Mercedes and beg and beg and beg you –

‘ Please don’t bloody go, Brian. Please don’t fucking go .’

But you and Peter drive away from the Baseball Ground, drive away to a garage to have the tyres on your club car changed and the tank of your club car filled up on the club account, and then you and Peter drive on to Peter’s house –

To the silence in his sitting room. The silence and the cup of tea –

‘What will you do now?’ you ask him .

‘ I think I’ll catch a bloody plane to Majorca,’ he says. ‘What about you? ’

‘I haven’t a fucking clue,’ you tell him –

It is Tuesday 16 October 1973, and you are out of a job .

Under another bloated grey Yorkshire sky, they are dirty and panting again, dirty and panting in their purple tracksuits with their names on their backs. There are still no smiles. There is still no laughter. Just the stains on their knees, the stains on their arses. I have given up on smiles here. I have given up on laughter now.

Maurice and Sydney stand to one side, heads together, crooked and hunched, whispering and muttering, whispering and muttering, whispering and muttering.

Jimmy stands in the middle, doing a bit of this, doing a bit of that, a joke here and a joke there. But no one is smiling. No one is laughing. No one is even listening –

Except the press and the fans. Behind the fence. Through the wire –

Their eyes are on me now, inspecting and examining, watching and observing me, staring and staring and staring at me –

No more zombies , I’m thinking. No more fucking zombies, Brian .

I walk up to Maurice and Sydney. I take the whistle off Sydney. I take the bibs off Maurice and I get some five-a-sides going; me on one side, Clarkey on another.

I know they all want to tackle me, to tackle me hard, to bring me down, down to the ground, back down to earth, to see me fall flat on my face or my arse again –

Bruised and aching, aching and hurting, hurting and smarting …

But I read the move and I collect the pass, collect the pass with my back to the goal, back to the goal and I shield the ball from McQueen, shield the ball from McQueen and I hold it, hold it and I turn, turn and I hit it, hit it on the volley, on the volley straight into the top corner, into the top corner and past Stewart’s hand, past Stewart’s hand as it flails around, as it flails around and the ball hits the back of the net –

The back of the fucking net, the fucking net –

But there’s no applause. No adoration. No love here –

No smiles here. No laughter here .

‘Two-hundred and fifty-one goals,’ I tell them again. ‘Beat that!’

But they’re already walking off the training pitch, back to the dressing room, taking off their bibs and their tracksuit tops, throwing them to the ground –

Dirty and panting, panting and plotting, plotting and scheming .

The press and the fans. Behind the fence. Through the wire –

Their eyes on me, inspecting and examining me, watching and observing me, staring and staring and staring at me, but only when I look away –

I feel like death. I feel like death. I feel like death .

John Giles walks over to me. John Giles tells me, ‘I’ll be meeting up with the Eire squad on Sunday and then I’ll be going to go see the Spurs.’

‘Are you asking me or telling me, Irishman?’

‘Telling you, I suppose.’

‘Fingers crossed then,’ I tell him. ‘Fingers crossed.’

‘And there was me thinking you weren’t a superstitious man,’ he laughs.

* * *

It takes you a moment to remember. To remember why the phone is ringing. To remember why the doorbell is ringing. To remember why the press and the television, the pens and the microphones, the cameras and the lights, are all camped outside your house –

To remember why your three children are hiding in their rooms, under their beds with their fingers in their ears, their eyes closed –

It takes you that moment to remember you are no longer the manager of the Derby County Football Club, that you are out of a job and out of work –

But then you remember you’re not out of work. You do still have a job. You still have television. Still have ITV. England vs Poland. The World Cup qualifier –

The match they must win. Tonight. The biggest story since 1966 –

Bigger even than the resignation of Brian bloody Clough .

* * *

Bones. Muscles. Broken bones. Torn muscles. Flesh and meat. Carcasses and cadavers. The Friday lunchtime press conference; there should be no post-mortems here, only prophecies; no excuses, only optimism; confidence, not doubt; hope and never fear:

‘I only wish I had a fit Duncan McKenzie, a fit Paul Madeley, a fit Michael Jones, a fit Eddie Gray and an available Billy Bremner to take on Manchester City.’

‘Would you also like an available Hartford?’ they ask me; ask because Manchester City’s Asa Hartford was involved in an on-off transfer with Leeds back in 1971, a transfer Don pulled out of on medical grounds –

A hole in the heart; Hartford, not Revie .

‘He’ll be wanting to show off against us,’ I tell them. ‘Lots of players want to.’

But they don’t smile. They don’t laugh. They just look down at their notebooks, their spiral-bound notebooks, and they flick and click the tops of their ballpoint pens, flick and click, flick and click –