Chapter 148: Unwilling to be Lonely

"Here they come! Norwich have been sitting back all half, but who would have thought they would be the first to break forward!" In the thirty-fourth minute, the visitors finally launched an attack worth the name.

Tolliver’s long, flat pass went straight to Alder. In Norwich’s midfield, Gary Tolliver was the biggest man after Alder himself, a broad, unhurried player who looked as though he had been built for carrying other people’s mistakes.

Over the years Norwich had almost turned into a team of veterans, and that was not to be wondered at. Alder was the centrepiece, of course, but last season there had been Reyes as well. Now Reyes was gone, and in his place stood Tolliver.

Tolliver was not Reyes, though. Reyes had always been prone to injury, and his long layoff at Norwich had ended his time there. Tolliver was as strong as an ox, and in recent years he had missed only a handful of games in any season.

The moment Alder took the ball on the edge of the centre circle, Conlan, the Villa captain, charged at him and went into a slide tackle without a second’s hesitation.

Who was Alder? Once upon a time he had been the best player in England. He was old now, but he was still among the best number tens in the country.

He turned, pulled the ball back, and took the weight off it as lightly as a man lifting a cup of tea. Alder seemed to have expected Conlan’s slide all along.

"No, wait, Reyes is coming in! Conlan was just the decoy!" Neither man had said a word to the other, but after these few matches Conlan and Reyes had already built a tacit understanding.

"Back heel! Beautiful! Just as Reyes stretched out a foot, Alder flicked the ball back with his heel!"

Alder’s heel found Tolliver, and Tolliver did not hold it for a moment. He slid the ball to Wes Pettigrew, who clipped it straight into the penalty area.

"Carver! No! Carver has missed it! Barzley has knocked the ball off his toes!"

If it had been Tomlin on the end of that pass, then better than ninety per cent of the time it would have been a goal. It was a pity that it was Carver standing at the front of Norwich’s attack at that moment.

Clumsy. In build and in style Carver and Tomlin were alike in almost every way, but Tomlin was not nearly as clumsy. He was a traditional centre-forward, yes, but he had excellent skill with the ball at his feet, and both his feet were as good as each other. He could shoot from any angle.

"Carver has wasted a lovely chance made for him by his team-mates," Granger said in the commentary box. If Carver had adjusted his body and hit it first time, Norwich might well have been two goals up by now.

But there are no ifs and maybes in football. Carver had not finished the chance, and Villa seized the moment to launch a quick counter.

Barzley’s clearance bounced off a Norwich shin and landed at the feet of Faraday on the right. The tireless young full-back did not look up for a second longer than he needed to, and drove a pass down the touchline to Jurek.

"Fast! Far too fast! Jurek!" The old wingers of the game were nearly all heading for retirement, but in Europe the Czech lad was only just starting to show the world what he could do.

"They can’t stop him! Norwich cannot stop Jurek! He’s like a sports car that has just found the open road!" Jurek? A sports car? Pemberton had always been fond of that sort of line.

"Moorcroft is beaten, Jurek is into the box! Only the centre-half, Rowe, and the goalkeeper Brandwood are left in front of him!"

"Oh, he’s going to shoot! Jurek takes it early, low shot!"

"GOAL! IT’S IN! IT’S IN! Villa have equalised! One all at Villa Park!"

"Marek Jurek! Marek Jurek!" It was a low shot. As Rowe rushed across, Jurek kept it down, drove the ball hard along the grass, and Brandwood did not even have time to react.

"That lad is another one who wasn’t willing to be left alone out there," Saint muttered to himself as he watched Jurek wheeling away in wild celebration, a grin splitting his face.

Everyone in the ground had come to see the old rivals. Pryce against Alder, Tomlin against Carver, and there was the small matter of the manager serving his first game back after the ban.

But Jurek’s goal was good for Saint, and not bad for anyone else, because the victory in this match had the most direct bearing on him.

What Jurek had really stolen was the attention of Pryce and Tomlin, and above all Pryce’s. With Alder already on the scoresheet, it should have been Pryce who answered, and now it was Jurek who had done it, after taking Faraday’s pass and cutting through Norwich on the break.

Pryce could hardly be angry about that, of course. He and Tomlin were only happy for Jurek, and they were happy enough to use it as fuel. If a team-mate had already pulled things level, what was there to stop them going on and putting Villa in front?

"Oh, come on, we were ahead, why does it feel like we’re the ones who are rattled?" At Villa Park, the Norwich supporters in the away end found the scoreline completely unacceptable.

But compared with the fans, Fenner, on the touchline, was in a far worse state. Why had he got to his feet? It was not just to keep his players in their positions. It was because of what that scoreline meant.

One all. The number glared at him from the scoreboard. It did not only say that his team had been pegged back; it showed everyone how little hold he had over Norwich, especially when set beside the man in the other technical area.

They say there is no harm without comparison, but once the comparison is made, the damage is double.

Still, Fenner could not afford to dwell on it, because the game was running on, and if he could only lead Norwich to a win over Villa, all of this would stop being a problem. In football, the winner has always been in the right.

So Fenner called Alder to the touchline.

On the other side, Saint was not idle either. At the same moment he beckoned Reyes, the man who set the rhythm of Villa’s attack and defence, over to his side.

"Marco, do you know how to play this game now?" Saint had always taken a little trouble over Reyes, even though Reyes hardly needed teaching.

"I know," Reyes said with a nod. "Norwich are more anxious than we are. They’ve won one game all season."

"They are," Saint said. "Players and manager both, they’re desperate for a win, especially after the run they’ve been on." Football had never lacked upsets, but nine times out of ten, a side that scored first and then saw it taken away only tightened up and clung on.

"I know what to do," Reyes said, and nodded again, heavily this time.

Reyes had a Barcelona trophy cabinet and had not needed a manager’s guidance for years. But in the life Saint had come from, a man like Reyes would one day have turned to the dugout himself, and at this moment he was still only a player who had never thought about it.

That was why he was grateful for what Saint was giving him. It was not teaching in the old sense. It was a manager treating him as someone who understood the game.