MAYBE A SECRET DEAL HAS BEEN reached between Spain and Britain because the countries seem to have agreed to take on what have been up until now each nation’s least successful exports — football players. With a handful of exceptions, neither Spanish nor British players travel well and most have come home from their foreign adventures with their tales between their legs, unable to cope without beans on toast or mama’s gazpacho. Now there are four Spaniards at Liverpool, not counting the coach, three at Bolton Wanderers and two more at Arsenal. And three Britons, for heaven’s sake, at Real Madrid.
Every season that Florentino Pérez has been president, Real have signed a player they did not seem to need. Now Michael Owen’s arrival means that either he, Raúl, Fernando Morientes or Ronaldo must sit on the bench. Owen, while not quite a galáctico, is what they call a mediático — he attracts media attention. And when it comes to merchandising, he is still young and sweet enough to have the Blue Peter market sewn up.
So, there was a ripple of excitement but no shock when Owen signed. The reaction to Jonathan Woodgate’s arrival was different. The first question was: “Who?” It was quickly followed by: “Why?” The why is easy to answer. Woodgate, along with Walter Samuel, has been brought in to fill the gaps in defence. What raised eyebrows was that Pérez would part with such a wad for a player with injury problems and a personality that suggests he may not readily adapt to life at Real.
Marca, the football newspaper, said that Woodgate would not sell many shirts, adding archly that this was how it should be. The Barcelona-based El Mundo Deportivo, however, claimed that the world was baffled by the signing and suggested that it showed how much influence Beckham has at the club as it was “well known” that the England captain considered Woodgate — after Rio Ferdinand — the best defender in the British game.
This is not the first time that three British players have simultaneously been on the books of a foreign club. Back in the 1980s, Gary Lineker, Steve Archibald and Mark Hughes were briefly at Barcelona at the same time but were not eligible to all play at once. As far as Real are concerned, in the past at least one Englishman has had an important impact on the club. At the start of the 20th century, Arthur Johnson was in charge of training and tactics. A former Corinthians player, it was he who decreed that Real — like Corinthians — should wear white. He laid down four important principles: the team should have a captain; players should always play in the same position; they should be willing to fetch the ball when it went out of play; and they should develop “the passing of the ball between the players, a practice almost wholly absent”. He also tried to crack down on smoking and drinking during matches.
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It was the English who started it all in Spain back in 1890, when the first official match was played between the Seville English Colony and Recreativo de Huelva, the founding team of the modern league. Of the 21 players who turned out — Seville were one short — all but two were English, as were the two referees. Since then the English influence has waned. This season we have a chance to see if all that has changed. Will the trio succumb to the mysterious delights of cocido madrileño — a local stew — or will the call of beans on toast be too powerful to resist?
STEPHEN BURGEN