Godfather Of Champions

In the room on the twentieth floor of the hotel, Twain and Allan were looking at each other. There was no one else in the standard room except them. They could talk in private. Indeed, Allan Adams did not look for Tony Twain to talk about old times, but to discuss business—there was almost no possibility of them discussing any private matters.

“Are you telling the truth?” Twain’s voice was full of doubts.

“You know I never kid, Tony.” Allan shook his head and looked serious. He did not look like he was joking.

Hearing him say so, Twain raised his eyebrows.

He had never heard of such a thing, but the truth was really in front of him.

Allan told Twain that the Chinese Football Association wanted to re-establish its image with this game due to the recent football environment in China. When Twain heard this point just now, he almost blurted out, “They have an image?!” Hence, he did not take Allan’s words seriously. As a matter of fact, everything about the Chinese Football Association was basically a joke. There was slapstick style, black humor, and of course, corny jokes as well.

However, what Allan said next stopped Twain from laughing, “… They hope we can tie with the national team in this game.”

This remark immediately caused Twain to knit his brows.

To pre-determine the outcome of the match?

But it was not difficult technically. “A large-scale rotation will do. I can deploy every player on the reserve team. Surely the China Olympic team can manage to tie, right? I can also train the team as well…”

“No, Tony. If you deploy the reserve team our plan for the commercial games will be met with heavy losses. Aide Group hoped that we can deploy the main force as much as possible.”

“Huh?” Twain stood up from the couch and said, “Deploy the entire main force to draw with the China Olympic team? Are you insulting our team’s ability?”

Allan waved for him to sit down and said, “That’s why I wanted to talk to you. I know your character, but I hope you can cooperate this once. This is very important for us to open up the Chinese market. You know, in China, no matter who you work with, you always can’t bypass the government…”

Twain sat down again and looked at The Ellen opposite. Adams: “You know China a lot better than before. . . I understand you. “I’s going

Seeing that Twain was not angry, Allan continued, “You can do this with a little flair and make the game thrilling with a lot of goals. And then… in the second half, you can start to change players, replace the main players, try a new lineup and observe the new players. Didn’t you bring in a few players from the youth team? You can take this opportunity to observe their abilities… With regards to these matters, you’re more of an expert than I am as the manager. You should know what to do. In other words, … there was actually no adverse impact on our image. After all, it is the reserve team which was forced to a draw …”

Twain interrupted his words, “Does the China Olympic team know this?”

Allan shook his head in reply, “They won’t know. The Chinese Football Association’s request to them is to strive hard and play to the best…”

“Play to the best of their abilities, fully display their style, study hard, accumulate experience…” Twain helped him finish. He could recite these entreaties.

At this point, he suddenly recalled a long-forgotten memory that had been from at least a decade ago.

In the early days of the professionalization of Chinese football, in addition to the emerging professional leagues which awakened the enthusiasm of Chinese fans for football, there was one thing that was an important evidence to that era… It could even be said to be a sign of the times.

That was the commercialization of the football games all over China.

From Sampdoria’s visit to China in 1994 until 1997, when Maradona led Boca Juniors to China on a “Heroes’ Tour of the Great Wall.” The Chinese football had experienced a dream-like era. “The Undefeated Workers’ Stadium” was the famous catchphrase of that era. Sampdoria, AC Milan, Arsenal, Club Atlético Peñarol and Grêmio all lost to the Chinese team at the Workers’ Stadium. The success against the foreign teams greatly boosted the confidence and enthusiasm of the Chinese fans, thus directly triggering the 1994 and 1995 red-hot Chinese Jia-A League.

Many people were immersed in the joy of beating the world-class strong teams, and even believed that the level of Chinese football had reached such a high level. But when Grêmio lost to China’s Guoan in 1996, the competitive Scolari made an angry attack at a press conference due to the many controversial penalties which were favorable to Guoan during the game and shattered the Chinese fans’ beautiful vision of the commercial games. He said, “I finally understand why so many strong teams lost here. If you only rely on the referee to win, then I believe you will never have a chance to reach the World Cup finals, never!”

Immediately following which, in order to prove that Scolari was definitely not recklessly venting due to the loss, the England national team came to China with its entire main lineup and defeated the Chinese national team with a three-goal victory in the Workers’ Stadium. It thoroughly informed the Chinese fans to take a look at the nature of the commercial game.

When all was said and done, the world’s top teams visited China to make money. Who would really fight it out for real and compete with a country’s team which was backward in football? Furthermore, the players playing on the field were worried that they might be injured by their opponent’s intense actions, so their strength was naturally diminished.

As to whether the Chinese Football Association had any private deals with the teams that came to China, a poor citizen like Twain would not know. But now he had a firsthand experience.

Twain was not surprised by the kind of things that happened under the guise of the Olympics. After all, there had been scandals erupting from the national Olympic team and the national team in succession some time ago. The image of the Chinese football plummeted. Just as the Olympic Games were about to start, if they could tie with the world’s strong team, it would spur the fans, and also gather some confidence for the upcoming national Olympic team.

In this respect, it was entirely understandable that the Chinese Football Association wanted the game to be a draw. After all, these people had never regarded football as football. The laws of the football world were naturally nonsensical in their eyes. The football game in their mind should be subjected to their arrangements. Whether it was the outcome or the process, whether it was the environment or the players, coaches and referees… All had to obey them.

See Twain’s sudden silence, Allan did not continue. He waited for Twain to answer.

Twain came out of his thoughts. He lifted his eyes to look at Allan sitting opposite.

“Okay, Allan. I’ll be sure to extend this courtesy to them.” Twain winked at Allan and said with a smile.

Allan relaxed his shoulders and finally had a smile on his face.

※※※

Nottingham Forest would only stay in China for five days, but there was a lot of things lined up for them and time was very tight. Aide Group and Allan arranged a very intensive trip for the Forest team. If an ordinary person were to see them, he would unconsciously think that these people would split their bodies into two.

On the evening of their arrival in Ningbo, the team would attend a welcome dinner reception hosted by the city government and then returned to the hotel to rest.

The next morning, the team would go to Ningbo Fubang Stadium for raining to adapt to the venue. This training session was open to the public, but bought tickets were required to go in and watch. The fares ranged from fifty to three hundred yuan, and the scalpers might sell them for even higher. Because there were Beckham, van Nistelrooy, van der Vaart, George Wood, Franck Ribéry… and so many other star players. Their appeal to the fans was a tool for the businessmen to make money.

After the team got changed when the morning’s training ended, the team would attend a luncheon hosted by a Chinese sponsor for this event. During the luncheon, Twain and Allan would sign a three-year brand endorsement deal on behalf of Nottingham Forest. Over the next three years, this company would be allowed to use the image of the Nottingham Forest team to do publicity in China.

After an afternoon of basic training, some people could go back to the hotel to rest, while the others were busy. Beckham was going to attend a promotional event for one of the brands he endorsed. Dunn was invited by China’s state television to record a program about his working life at the English Premier League champion, Nottingham Forest. Both George Wood and Tony Twain would attend together the signing ceremony for the construction of the Armani store on Heyi Avenue in Haishu District, Ningbo, because both men were Armani’s brand ambassadors. Today was only to sign the agreement. This store would only be completed for the consumers next April.

The players did not have to attend any events that night, and they could have a night of free activities. It was believed that by then most people would choose to go out and do some shopping together. But even so, they could not relax too much. It was also because many media would tag along the way and reports on how they spent their time and shopping would appear the next day on television, newspapers, on the Internet and other media platforms.

On the other hand, Twain would follow the club’s top two executives, Evan and Allan to attend a celebrity gathering. Twain was the worst at this kind of activity, but he was unable to decline.

With no training on the third morning, all the players would have to dress up to visit the University of Nottingham’s Ningbo campus in Ningbo High Education Park. In the school’s stadium, the players played a little game with the local college students. For example, Beckham would teach the free kick and choose five players to have a simple one on one duel with the college students…

After a simple lunch at noon, the team would return to Fubang Stadium in the afternoon to continue the training open to public. The fans who bought tickets for the previous day’s training could enter directly with the tickets, and those who had lost or not bought them would have to purchase tickets again.

After the training, the players must immediately rush to Ningbo City Enmei Orphanage and to interact, give presents and care to the orphans there.

In the evening, after a quick dinner on the bus, the team would then rush to the television station and record a program with the lucky fans who had been selected, for about three and a half hours to four hours. By that time, it would already be late at night when these people headed back to the hotel exhausted.

They continued training on the fourth morning at Fubang Stadium, but this training was not open to the public. Because Twain would arrange detailed tactics for the evening’s game during this training session. By convention, such trainings were never public. Therefore, Aide Group did not sell tickets to this training session.

After lunch in the afternoon, the players would take a lunch break in the hotel to prepare for the evening game while Tony Twain had to attend a press conference. This was to launch the announcement of a partnership between Nottingham Forest and Zhejiang Greentown F.C., a local professional football club in Zhejiang Province.

In fact, to be frank, Greentown was the Forest team’s satellite club in China.

This was a big event involving football in Zhejiang Province, and Twain must attend.

After a simple dinner in the evening, the team would ride to Fubang Stadium, where the grand finale for their China trip was here—playing a friendly match with China’s National Olympic team, which had been training together for months, at Fubang Stadium in Ningbo City.

With Nottingham Forest winning the Champions League for the second year in a row as well as their Premier League title this year, they were The Double Winner and was unrivaled for a time. Their popularity in China also soared. Coupled with the game’s other team was the high-profile and highly anticipated by the locals, the China Olympic team, the tickets to the game sold like hot cakes. Originally, the Fubang Stadium could only accommodate thirty thousand spectators, so the organizers erected a special stand on the tracks. Thirty-five thousand out of forty thousand tickets sold, a result that should be considered good at a time when commercial football was getting less popular.

Aide Group suffered great losses on Real Madrid’s second visit to China a few years ago. This time at least they made it back with Nottingham Forest.

Early in the morning of the fifth day, Nottingham Forest would pack up and fly directly from Ningbo Lishe International Airport to Tokyo, Japan. They would start their four days and four nights of frenetic money-making in Japan.

※※※

Based on the schedule seen above, these few days would be a tough test for the players— wrong, Beckham had such an experience, so he could cope easily—it was miserable for the others who were tired as a dog.

In front of people, under the limelight, under the glare of the camera lens, in front of the media’s pervasive attention, they smiled as they faced the various occasions and tirelessly signed autographs for the fans, satisfied their requests for a photo. They carefully protected their public image.

When they were doing charity at the orphanage, everyone was very serious, and no one was too tired to shirk their jobs. This was what made Twain the proudest. Beckham, in particular, was simply the best example to the other teammates. No matter how many people surrounded him and what kind of requests the fans had, he always smiled and tried his best to fulfill. He never showed the slightest sign of impatience while being observed by others due to fatigue.

In the orphanage, being the most famous, he was also the most popular with the children. In front of the children with mental challenges and physical disabilities, he treated them like he would with his own children.

George Wood was a little awkward, but he tried hard.

The players only had time to eat on their way to the television station. But many people simply did not have the appetite to eat. After getting on the bus, they waved to the children, fans and reporters outside the window. Till the bus was finally out of sight, these dedicated “actors” only then leaned back on their seats and slept one by one.

If these star players were to replay their trip to China in their minds in the summer of 2008, what would be the only thing that stayed in their minds?

Tired?

So tired…