Chapter 883 - 883: Numbers

Sarah asked me on Thursday night why we let Ellis Cartwright go in June, and I did not have an answer.

I did not have one on Friday morning either. What I had was Southampton in 26 hours, so I put it in the drawer with the other 4 and went to work.

Mark Hughes brought a back 5 to Wembley and put 4 in front of it and told Danny Ings to chase Mamadou Sakho and do nothing else with his afternoon. 71 per cent of the ball, 14 crosses, and 2 shots worth the name.

Prrrp.

58 minutes. Routine 4, the near post one, and it went the way it has gone on pitch 2 about 300 times since July. Benteke went near, Tarkowski went near behind him, and Eberechi Eze arrived at the 1 yard of grass nobody covers.

Boom. 1-0.

75 minutes. They had to come out then, and there were 40 yards behind them for the first time all afternoon. Hakimi got to the byline and pulled it back and Ivan Perišić put it in from 8.

Crystal Palace 2 Southampton 0.

60,112 at Wembley, and I could hear individual voices in the 51st minute. 3 weeks after the draw. A crowd learns fast.

Marcus was outside the dressing room afterwards with a laptop under his arm, on a Saturday evening, because I had asked him something on Thursday night and Marcus does not wait to be asked twice.

"You wanted to know who else can take it with 2 men on him."

"Go on."

"It is not Højbjerg and it is not McArthur, and you already know about Rodríguez." He turned the screen round in the corridor. "Jack Grealish. 22 touches under pressure against Liverpool and he lost 3. He is the only man in that squad whose completion goes up when the second defender arrives."

"Why does it go up?"

"Because he waits for the foul and then he does not take it. He gets his body across and he plays through it, and the second man has already committed." He shut the laptop. "He has played 4 minutes since the ankle, Kovačić does not kick a ball until October, and Gary Neville has told Europe what our problem is. So it is Grealish or it is nobody."

I sat with Sarah for 2 hours on the Sunday afternoon, and she had it done before I had my coat off.

List B costs nothing and it has no limit on it. Any boy registered here without a break for 2 years since his 15th birthday goes on it. Nya Kirby, Tyrick Mitchell, Ryan Fletcher, Antoine Semenyo and Connor Blake, ours since they were children, available for every minute of a Champions League and not costing me a number off the 25.

That took her 4 minutes. Then she turned the sheet over and started taking places off me.

"Hakimi."

"He is 19."

"He signed on the 26th of July, 11 days after a World Cup final. That is 6 weeks, not 2 years. A list."

"Tuanzebe."

"27th of July." She was not writing any of it down. "Konaté has been here 14 months, Bowen came from Hull in January, Olise is 21 months past his 15th birthday, and Cartwright you already know about. 6 of your 25 gone before you pick a footballer."

"And the trained quota?"

"8 of the 25 have to be locally trained and at least 4 of those 8 have to be club trained, which is 36 months registered here between 15 and 21." She turned the pen round. "Wilf, Aaron, Ebere and Cartwright. That is your 4, and Cartwright is only on it because club trained does not have to be unbroken, which is the first time those 47 days have done him a favour."

"So it fits."

"It fits exactly, and you are not going to like how."

She had 27 names for 25 places, and 2 of them had to come off.

The first one is a rule rather than a decision. UEFA want 2 goalkeepers on List A and 3 across both lists together, and Ryan Fletcher is 18 and has been here since he was 10 and goes on List B for nothing. So Pope and Krul cover List A, Fletcher covers the third, and Wayne Hennessey does not need to be on that sheet for us to be legal.

I went to him first thing Monday and told him the arithmetic before I told him anything else, because Wayne Hennessey has been a professional for 13 years and would have worked it out on his own by lunchtime.

"So Fletcher is the 3rd."

"On paper. You are the 3rd in this building and you know it."

"Does it change the cups?"

"Not a minute of them."

"Then that is that," he said, and went to find Steele, and did 9 days of doubles afterwards and never brought it up again.

The second one was mine. Alexandre Pato is 28 and he is the 4th of 4 forwards and he was passed over for an 18-year-old in Tallinn, and 25 is 25.

He was already stood up when I got to the end of it.

"You are taking Cartwright and Olise."

"I am."

"Then you are taking the right ones." He put his hand out. "I have got 3 cups and a league to be in, boss. Do not make it into a funeral."

Then there was Rodríguez, and Rodríguez I had to deal with before the list went in.

He had come to me on Thursday night and offered to play 20 yards deeper than he likes at San Siro, to give Rúben Neves a second option when Brozović goes with him, and he had told me to say it to him before Monday and not after.

I said it to Neves in the corridor outside the gym, and it took about 15 seconds.

"In Milan you will have a man on you from the 1st minute, because that is what they do to the best player in the opposition. James is going to play next to you so that there is always somewhere to put it."

Rúben Neves is 21 and he has been the best midfielder in this league since the 11th of August.

"Is that you or is that him?"

"It is him. He came to me on Thursday."

He stood there with a bottle in his hand and thought about it.

"Then tell him thank you," Neves said, "and tell him to sit closer than he thinks he needs to."

The list went in at 11 minutes past 11 on Monday night. 25 names, 8 of them locally trained, 4 of those club trained, and Sarah counted it twice before she sent it.

Nathan had come in at 10 past 4 that afternoon with his phone already out, because FIFA had put the finalists up and there are 3 names on the player list and Achraf Hakimi is one of them, alongside Cristiano Ronaldo and Mohamed Salah. 2 of the 3 coaches are Didier Deschamps and Zinedine Zidane.

"And the 4th seat," Nathan said.

"I worked out on Thursday that there was one."

"You worked out that there was one. You did not know it was that."

I told the squad in 90 seconds on the Monday and 5 of them found out they were free, and Connor Blake asked the only question anybody asked.

"Does List B mean anything is different?"

"You are on a team sheet on Tuesday night the same as anybody else."

"Right," he said. "Good."

By 11 o'clock on the Tuesday there were 14 cars gone off that car park and Deano was stood in the middle of it with a clipboard, counting bags out the way he counts them in. Pope and Chilwell with England and 4 more with the 21s. Zaha flying to Abidjan, Benteke to Brussels, Perišić to Zagreb, and Rodríguez to Bogotá, which is 5,000 miles and 6 hours of time difference, twice, in 9 days, and he went to Rebecca about it before he came to me.

17 men stayed at Beckenham.

An empty training ground in an international week is the quietest a football club ever gets, and it is the only 9 days in a season when a manager gets to watch the men he does not pick.

Scott Dann ran it. He is 31, he is the captain of this football club, and he has 4 minutes of football to his name since May, and for 9 days he ran a back 4 that will not play a match together all season because somebody had to and he wanted it. On the Thursday he stopped a session to move Tyrick Mitchell about 3 feet and had him do it again 6 times. On the 6th one Dann said nothing and walked away, and from him that is a medal.

Wayne Hennessey did doubles every morning with Steele and Krul. 6 days in, Steele put him on the shooting drill last instead of first, which is as close as Michael Steele has ever come to apologising to a human being, and Hennessey took his turn and did not mention Monday all week.

Pato stayed out after every session. Bray fed him balls every time and did not say anything to me about it, and I did not say anything to Bray, and the pair of us did that for 9 days.

Connor Blake and Ellis Cartwright trained like 2 lads who had been told something on a Monday morning.

Ron did his first Wednesday on the 5th and got through 11 of the 40 in 3 hours, because he talks to each of them for a quarter of an hour and he does not know another way. Cooke put the sheet on my desk on the Thursday with nothing written on it.

9 of the 11 are playing somewhere. 1 emigrated to Adelaide 2 years ago, and after the boy had put the phone down his mother stayed on the line with Ron for another 20 minutes.

And 1 is the goalkeeper.

"He would not talk to me."

"At all?"

"He was polite. Said he was busy, put it down. 11 seconds." Ron had his flask on the desk in front of him. "It takes 13 months to learn to do it in 11 seconds, gaffer."

***

Thank you to Sir nameyelus for the support.