Writers block and tackle

It had seemed like an opportunity too good to miss: by returning victoriously where Sven’s fops had failed, the writers would get their revenge for the battles they had lost against Rooney & co in the bestseller lists.

I soon realised that there are reasons why writers don’t usually make good footballers.

First, they are immobile creatures. Chained to their laptops, they usually have swift fingers but stiff knee joints. Secondly, writers are not natural team-players. They mistrust other human beings, and in particular other writers.

One novelist was unhappy to play because another novelist in our squad had given him a poor review in a national paper — almost ten years ago.

Thirdly, writers tend to be cerebral types. They enjoy ruminating over ideas, mind-mapping plot developments, rewriting sentences — spontaneity isn’t usually their forte.

In a Premiership match in 2002, Manchester United’s Roy Keane was sent off for elbowing Sunderland’s Jason McAteer, his fellow Irish international, in the face. McAteer then famously taunted Keane, who had just published an autobiography, by making a pen-scribbling gesture and mouthing “Put that in your book”. In a team full of writers, would “I’ll put that in my book” be the mantra in every player’s head as we were mounting an attack?

Would they forget to shoot because they were already paraphrasing their goal celebrations? I remembered why the Monty Python sketch about the Philosophers’ Football Match was funny: everyone just walks around the pitch in circles, thinking.

As if these weren’t already plenty of obstacles to overcome, the Italian organisers presented us with a complicated set of rules. Authors of at least one work of fiction were allowed to take part in the tournament, on condition that at least 300 copies of the work had been printed, that it was distributed in Italy and that it had been regularly available for sale since publication.

Playwrights were allowed, but only if their plays had been published. Poets had to stay at home. Authors of nonfiction works were permitted, but only if they had written more than one book. A century of modernist invention, undone by football officials. In my nightmares, I had to turn down Norman Mailer because he didn’t qualify as fiction.

Still, the team slowly started to take shape. Writers from across the country — Bristol, Norwich, Oxford, Manchester, even expats from France and America — signed up for the cause. This, of course, meant that regular training sessions were a problem.

We needed additional motivation to wrench the scribblers away from their writing desks — so I decided to organise a friendly against a team of critics from the Times Literary Supplement, the London Review of Books and the New Statesman. The prospect of revenge spurred the writers to a clear 4-1 victory.

The margin of that triumph was deceptive: the team was lacking in structure, in discipline. Our positioning, for one, was decidedly stream- of-consciousness.

We were like a promising manuscript in desperate need of a good editor. That organising force emerged, eventually, in the person of Nigel Spackman, who agreed to take an hour out of his busy managerial schedule at Millwall to kick the writers’ team into the shape.

Spackman is a modern type of football manager — intelligent, articulate and very likeable. During the warm-up exercises, we even chatted about our favourite Italian wines. This “training” looked like a stroll in the park. Then Nigel’s assistant, Willie Donachie, the former Scotland international, took over the session.

Willie is bad cop to Nigel’s good cop, and he made us suffer.

After an hour of exercise, most of us collapsed on the floor, gasping for breath. We felt like Proust characters who had accidentally been written into a Chuck Palahniuk story.

Still, we had given our best: running, shooting and tackling as if we were auditioning for a Premiership contract. Once we had regained our composure, we asked Nigel for his verdict. For a five-a-side game, he said, we would be all right. The tournament was eleven-a-side, we said. OK, Nigel said, and looked at us for a minute. In that case, the most important thing we needed was a goalkeeper. We all laughed, except for Nigel, who looked concerned. We really needed a goalkeeper.

The opening match against the hosts Italy will kick off on Friday, and we are optimistic. If Nigel’s tactics and Willie’s nutmegs won’t do the trick, we have a few more cards up our sleeve. After all, verbal taunts, not football skills, won the last World Cup final. Penguin have provided us with a complete set of Shakespeare’s plays, and if the Italians get too cocky, we might give a little recital on the pitch: you might win this match, amico mio, but can you beat this?

THE SQUAD

Tim Adams (Being John McEnroe)

Tobias Jones (The Dark Heart of Italy)

Haydn Middleton (Grimm’s Last Fairytale)

Benjamin Markovits (Either Side of Winter)

Patrick Neate (City of Tiny Lights)

Nicholas Royle (Antwerp)

Jake Wallis Simons (The Exiled Times of a Tibetan Jew)

Andrew Smith (Moondust)

Craig Taylor (Return to Akenfield)

Sam Taylor (The Republic of Trees)

Conrad Williams (The Unblemished)

John Wray (The Right Hand of Sleep)

Coach: Matt Weiland (The Thinking Fan’s Guide to the World Cup) President: Philip Oltermann