Hughes, the purest and most elegant intelligence of current Spanish journalism, wrote it after Sampaoli’s match against Sevilla and his ‘bald’ bilardismo (that includes Papu’s knee to Valverde in a commando action like those of the Easy company for disable the German cannons that beat the beaches of Normandy): -All the danger came from Vinicius, with his smile of Erroll Garner, that jazz pianist, and his same happy genius. He is the Erroll Garner of football. In the Awards Week, where even Barcelona gets the stones, the Erroll Garner (‘Play Misty for Me’, 1971, Clint Eastwood’s directorial debut) seems to me the best prize out of competition for the best footballer outside contest, Vinicius, the only one who, once fed up with football, compensates one for the inconvenience of returning to the stadium. Among those inconveniences is that of putting up with the pipero (another invention of Hughes, like that of liberalio) next door who despairs when Vinicius does not get the rabbit out of his hat, a handicap from the job of supreme haggler and something that even happens to him David Copperfield, the magician capable of throwing Claudia Schiffer out as a girlfriend, but the one I saw fail in Madrid’s Palacio de los Deportes when he tried to fly away Jesús Polanco, the ‘Jesus of Great Power’ that Guerra said. The pipero is a victim of the Story, which decreed in his day that Vinicius was another meme, and, whatever he does, he is no longer going to give his arm to twist, so he will try to make life impossible for the media. To pretend that he backs down, the Story says that ‘the good guy’ is Rodrygo, the very Spanish trick of praising someone: the target is Vinicius. And when all of Madrid is coming at them, then they come out with the idea that Madrid is…cholista. -Sometimes we look at ourselves too much in the mirror -Ancelotti has said, and why do we want more? And just as nature, in the works of the metaphysicians, held the mirror where man looked at himself, Cholo, in the works of the rapporteurs, holds the mirror where Madrid looks, which has Vinicius dazzling where cholismo has turned off to Joao Félix, who one day will consider his face in the mirror… and will leave, to forget what he looked like. In this Ancelotti’s Madrid, cholista is not even Valverde’s cannon, an alloy of Ari Haan’s in Cruyff’s Ajax and Ronald Koeman’s in Cruyff’s Barcelona (the mark of the ball is read in each shot of these people), only that Valverde has the advantage of Tyson, who hit with both hands. The origin of the alleged madridista ‘cholism’ is a summer snake (in summer of San Miguel!) like that of the alleged Pemanian ‘joking’ of a pious… horny. «My dear friend», Luis Calvo, director of ABC, wrote to Emilio Romero, director of Pueblo: «José María Pemán, a month ago, received a ‘coup de télephone’ at his home in Madrid: she was a lady. ‘Mr. Pemán -he told him- she; Forgive me for bothering you, but since you are an academic and you know so much about words, I would like to ask you a question. Yesterday I read an article by Mr. Romero, in Pueblo, where he puts something that seems very wrong to me.’ Pemán answered: ‘What was it?’ ‘I can’t tell you. I’m ashamed…’ ‘Then, this conversation has no purpose…’ And the lady, very blushing, in a timid tone, pronounced this word: ‘I joke’. And she hung up the phone. I think of this funny anecdote when in a book by Thomas de Quincey I come across a verse written in Latin by that famous English essayist: ‘Et responsum est cum cachinno’. Here is the substitute for ‘joking’: Cachinno, which means: mockery and laughter. That is to say, ‘horny’». Seriously, Madrid took advantage of Saturday to introduce us to the winners Courtois and Benzema. Courtois, the consolation of the Yashine Award, because goalkeepers, according to David Vidal, are not soccer players (“soccer players are the ones who score goals”). And Benzema, the consecration of the Ballon d’Or, ‘a people’s award’ he said when picking it up, like Juan Guerra’s brother when ‘picking up’ Rumasa. Calling the Ballon d’Or ‘People’s Award’ is like calling Varadero’s Beach ‘People’s Beach’, as Fidel did. Later, Sevilla and again the outburst: that snatch from Madrid like milk that takes you ahead in three minutes. Saturday’s trigger was Bono’s billiard tale to lose/gain time on the clock. The fear is that the World Cup could carry this Carlettona euphoria as 11M took that of Queiroz’s galácticos, a circumstance that the Story would take advantage of to leave us in the arms of City, Best Team on Earth, and Gavi, Best Young Player in the Galaxy. -Play it, Vini.
