Godfather Of Champions

 “George Wood! Goal! Gooal! Gooooal!!”, screamed the commentator, “Nottingham Forest lead again! Ahh! This is an amazing goal! George Wood started dribbling from midfield and went straight for goal! Even though he was under pressure from both Gerrard and Mascherano, he still managed to score! This midfielder doesn’t score often, let alone a beautiful goal like this!”

After watching Wood shoot the football into the goal behind Reina, Mascherano hammered the ground with his fist. He regretted not pushing Wood hard enough just now…

Did Gerrard regret not going for Wood’s leg with his tackle earlier?

Wood was stunned for a moment after scoring and seemed to have forgotten to celebrate. When Aaron Mitchell and Ibišević rushed forward to celebrate with him, he pushed them away and ran straight to the technical area.

Twain was already standing up when Wood broke through Gerrard and Mascherano’s defense into the penalty area. His fists were clenched as he waited to celebrate the goal. When he saw Wood running towards him, he rushed out of the technical area as well with his arms wide open, waiting to have a passionate hug with Wood.

Wood was the one who saved his tenth anniversary so Twain had to thank him properly.

“Ah ha! Come on George! Let me give you a passionate hug!! You little darling!”, Twain exclaimed while he poised himself in front of everyone, waiting for Wood to jump into his embrace.

But Wood passed him by like the wind without even looking at him, as if he was air…

“Hey…”

Eastwood was standing not far away from Twain. He was happy that the team regained the lead of course, even though this goal was scored by Wood. But he still got up from his seat to celebrate with his colleagues around him. Right at this moment, Wood jumped straight at him and gave him a hug.

“Hey!”

“Ah!”

Everyone around were like birds that got frightened by Wood as they dispersed.

Eastwood could feel that Wood was hugging him very tightly and he was still exerting more force, causing him to have difficulty breathing.

“W… ood…”, Eastwood could barely speak, “Are you… are you… trying to suffocate me…”

Wood had no intention of letting go as he buried his head in Eastwood’s shoulder, muttering something under his breath. However, the environment was so noisy that even if Wood was right next to his ears, Eastwood could not tell what he was saying.

What is he saying? What is he doing?

Eastwood’s head was filled with questions like these then.

Twain stretched out an arm and patted Wood on the head, shouting, “Enough, George! Are you trying to murder your coach cum ex-teammate?”

As expected, the Boss’ words were most effective. After Twain said that, Eastwood could feel the pressure on him loosening. Wood let go of him then looked at him and said, “Sorry.”

Before Eastwood could appreciate what he said, Wood turned and jogged away.

He never did gave the main star of this match a “passionate” hug, but Twain did not mind.

“Ten years late.”, Twain smiled in front of Eastwood as he said this. “But he has always been an awkward person.”

Eastwood looked at the view of Wood’s back, nodded and said, “That’s right, an awkward person…”

“Wood ran over for a hug with Eastwood after scoring, what a heartwarming scene! This hug between them squashed any rumors about any internal conflict within Nottingham Forest that was spreading previously. The rumors that George Wood caused Eastwood’s early retirement can stop now…”, the commentator said with a sigh after watching this scene.

Just like how the world-class ball by Gerrard was able to boost Liverpool’s morale, George Wood’s goal and his hug with Eastwood after scoring similarly was able to boost Nottingham Forest’s morale. If the Forest team was like a huge family, then everyone in the family would be just like a friend. When there was an argument between friends, even if it did not affect them directly, as a member of the family, they would feel bad and be affected by it too.

The reason why this incident between Eastwood and George Wood caused the team to perform badly during the past few matches was not because Wood was in a bad form.

So when everyone saw Wood gave Eastwood a hug in public, they were finally able to put down the rock that was in their hearts. The effect of this on the team’s morale was much more obvious than Gerrard’s world-class ball.

In the match later, the captain who had regained the trust of his team led Nottingham Forest to totally suppress Liverpool on the field. Tony Twain’s adjustment to make Wood the focal point of the attack was totally out of Benítez’s expectation. What was even more out of the expectations of the Liverpool players was Wood’s resolve when attacking. There was a feeling of “Do-or-die” in his movements. Must score, must succeed, must win!

In the 77th minute of the match, Nottingham Forest scored another goal. The scorer this time was Aaron Mitchell. He received the ball from Wood in the penalty area and used his long legs to his advantage as he evaded Skrtel’s defense before striking the ball unexpectedly. The ball took a deflection off Agger’s leg and took Reina by surprise.

3 : 1!

However, this score line was still unable to let Twain stay in his seat at ease. Everyone knew what kind of a team Liverpool was, they were well-known to be good at mounting comebacks. Furthermore, this was their home ground—Anfield Stadium. More than forty thousand fans would forever be their staunch shield, their twelfth man on the field.

As long as the match was not over, even if they were leading by two goals, Twain could not claim that they had the match won.

Luckily, the players on the field also knew what kind of team Liverpool was. They started to draw back and played a counterattacking game which made Liverpool unable to go all out in attack.

This move did make things difficult for Liverpool.

Liverpool only got some good chances during the last five minutes of the match when they gave up on defending. After all, during the last five minutes, there would be no difference even if the opponent scored ten goals if they could not score themselves. The whole team pressed forward and bombarded the Forest goal under the encouragement of the song “You’ll never walk alone”.

In the 89th minute, they managed to score a goal. There was chaos in front of the Forest goal then and nobody knew who kicked the ball, or if the ball hit someone, but the ball flew into the goal. Akinfeev made a diving action but he was still too late.

This goal boosted Liverpool’s morale and they wanted to go from strength to strength and level the match. However, Nottingham Forest did not give them another chance like that. The situation was tense but Forest eventually managed to defend the score line.

When the referee blew the whistle for full time after the four minutes of stoppage time, boos rang out on the stands against Tony Twain — This bastard managed to grind out a win again and escaped unscathed during his tenth anniversary.

Twain appeared to be very happy as he stood up to shake hands and hugged everyone. They congratulated him on his victory in this memorable match.

Next, Twain walked towards Benítez with his hand extended out from quite some distance away. The smile on his face was as if a cherry blossom had blossomed.

Benítez really wanted to avoid Twain at that moment, but under the watchful eyes of the public, where could he hide?

“Congratulations, Mister Twain.”, Benítez said, as he had no choice but to shake hands with Twain.

“Ha, thank you. This was a good match. You guys did well.”, Twain replied with a smile on his face.

Their hands touched lightly and it constituted to be a handshake. Benítez turned and walked away while Twain returned to embrace his players on the field, thanking them for their efforts to make this wonderful night a success.

He put his arms around Wood’s neck and pulled Eastwood over. Facing the crowds of reporters, he said loudly, “Sorry to disappoint you!”

“Hey, Tony! Regarding your ten years here, do you have anything to talk about?” The reporters were not bothered by Twain’s taunting. They were used to his temperaments after working with him for so long, he loved to talk on the spur of the moment.

looked at Wood in his arms, then looked at Eastwood by his side before proudly saying, “Look for yourselves, my ten years are all here.”

Some reporters got close to ask Wood about that embrace and he resumed his cold expression and replied simply, “Goal celebration.”

The reporters added, “How did you come up with the idea of hugging Eastwood to celebrate your goal?”

Wood replied, “I ran over and I saw him, then we hugged.”

Twain heard Eastwood mumble very softly at his side, “How awkward…”

He smiled.

Back in the dressing room, Evan Doughty and Allan Adams were already waiting there to present a memorial trophy to Twain.

“So sorry, Tony. We couldn’t present this trophy to you in front of so many people on the field.”, Evan said while passing the crystal cup to Twain.

“That’s not important, Mister Chairman.”, Twain replied. In front of the team, he was still very formal. “I’m already very satisfied with winning the match. My team has already given me the best trophy.”, he said in front of the whole team, in response, he got the cheers and applause of the players.

At this moment, Eastwood stepped up and told Twain, “Boss, the team has another gift for you.”

As he was still a player in the team not long ago, coupled with his popularity within the team, Eastwood’s main job after becoming a coach was to link up the players with the coaches and act as a bridge between them. He was elected as the spokesperson of the team now.

Before Twain could understand what was going on, Eastwood snapped his finger and both Bale and Pepe came in with a big cake in the shape of a crown. There were ten red rubies made of cherries on the crown which represented the ten seasons that Tony Twain stayed in the Forest team. In the middle of the crown, written in red jam was:

Just ten years, just beginning.

“Boss, we hope that you can stay for ten years, and ten more years after.”, Pepe spoke of the whole team’s wishes when he presented the cake.

Twain had tears in his eyes. This was unexpected to him and he thought these players were too adorable.

Thank you.”, he choked a little on his reply.

“Okay, don’t make the atmosphere so gloomy!”, Kerslake shouted at the side as he gave a look to a few people at the side.

Wood and Eastwood held on to Twain on both sides while Pepe, who was still so warm and touching earlier, suddenly smashed the cake onto Twain’s face…

“Happy tenth anniversary, boss! Ha ha!”

The reporters waited for a long time for the Nottingham Forest manager who was late. However, his appearance gave everyone present a shock, including Benítez who was getting a little impatient…

Twain’s face was white and there were only two eyes which could be seen. At first glance, everyone thought that a skeleton had entered. His dark red suit were smeared with white and red paste-like substance and his hair which were dyed black became white again.

“This is cream.”, Twain explained matter-of-factly to the shell-shocked audience as he took his seat. “There was a mini ‘war’ in the dressing room earlier… As revenge for what they did, I decided to come out looking like this, to let you see what I’ve been through! You have to write this in your reports and scold them on my behalf. This is concrete proof of the internal strife within the Nottingham Forest dressing room!”

While he was talking seriously, some reporters on the ground could not take it and laughed. Even Benítez could not help but to smile while shaking his head.

However, some reporters felt embarrassed by what Twain said. Even an idiot could tell the sarcasm behind the last sentence that Twain uttered. He was mocking the media whom reported that the Forest team was not united internally previously.

Channel bbc5 “Match of the Day”used this scene as this week’s special behind-the-scenes footage at the end of the program. Lineker laughed very happily as he watched Twain complained about how his team treated him on the screen.

“This is Tony Twain’s tenth anniversary. Nottingham Forest managed to take down the toughest fortress, Anfield, George Wood and Eastwood seems to have put down their differences, he received a crystal trophy from the club as well as the ‘special gift’ that his team gave him… Ha!”, Linekar laughed.

The report that Beesley published in his column was totally different from what he wrote when he was enjoying the football on display at Anfield. The draft that he wrote in the stadium had been deleted by him. In the report that everyone could see, he congratulated Tony Twain on his victory and he thought that Forest deserved their victory. However, at the end, he was still a little bitter as he wrote, “Nottingham Forest is Tony Twain’s team. With Tony Twain, they’re invincible. But if Tony Twain’s not there… Nottingham Forest may want to consider the shrugging off the “Twain Dependency Disease” in future…

However, the Nottingham Forest fans obviously would not be willing to consider this issue. To them, Tony Twain would be like Ferguson and work in the City Ground his whole life, retiring only when he was too old to continue working. Then everyone would build a life-sized bronze statue for him outside the stadium. Even if he was no longer the manager, his influence would still be around every inch of Nottingham Forest.

This should be the curtain call that a Forest King should have.

Everyone believed that this ten years was just the first step of Tony Twain’s legacy in Nottingham Forest. He was only forty-five years old, he still had a second ten years, a third ten years, even…a fourth ten years.