SHORTLY after the final whistle sounded at Old Trafford last Wednesday week, Foul Play s mobile phone emitted a shrill beep to signify that there was a new text message awaiting his scrutiny.
Calling it up on the screen, I was less than astonished to discover that it was from a Spurs fan of my acquaintance, who combines his Shite Hart Lane obsession with virulent non-supportance of Manchester United.
Yessssssssssssssssss!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!? read the message, with the upside-down question mark tacked onto the end for good measure.
Now, pause and reflect on the length of time it must have taken this individual to type out that message (I think it involves pressing the 1 key on the phone about twelve times for each exclamation-mark sign). I love this kind of thing, truly I do.
Thus, with one bound, Foul Play ascended to the summit of the moral high ground, if only because he had restrained himself from acting in similar fashion after Barcelona s 5-1 fisting of Chelsea the previous night. I had cheered for Barga during the match, admittedly, but only because I had money on them.
The result in the Nou Camp shouldn t have come as too much of a shock, if only because the Catalans have been ripping apart good sides in Europe all season. The bald statistics three against a Hertha Berlin who had already beaten Chelsea, four against Porto, Fiorentina and Arsenal, five against AIK Solna and Sparta Prague merely bear out the fact that Barcelona possess the greatest forward line of the modern age. We already knew that.
The same can t be said of their back three, but for Chelsea to insinuate themselves into a position whereby they were within seven minutes of eliminating such opponents was an achievement of sorts. Indeed, there was a 15-minute period directly after Tore Andri Flo s goal where Barcelona s sense of direction and purpose went walkabout. In that time, Chelsea could and should have put them away with what would have been a killer second away goal.
Then fate, and Bernard Lambourde, took a hand.
Lambourde is one of those guys, like Jes Hxgh and Carlo Cudicini, that you only tend to see in the small print of the Chelsea subs bench and not in person. At least, one hopes that rustiness was the primary explanation for the ghastliness of his inadequacy.
His mistakes finished Chelsea off, but one got the impression that if he hadn t fucked up, one of his team-mates would have done, such was the intensity of the pressure they were under.
Twenty-four hours later at Old Trafford, for Lambourde read Mikakl Silvestre. At the time of writing, what Denis Irwin did to get hauled off at half-time is still not entirely clear, but I can t have been the only United fan to have uttered a painful groan when I saw the Frenchman s gormless countenance looming into view at the start of the second half. Phil Neville, for all his faults, at least knows the basics of covering and tackling.
Fergie s brainstorm was duly punished with two of the worst derelictions of duty you will ever see at an Old Trafford European night (for Real s second, Silvestre literally ran away from Razl as the striker bore down on goal). But it would be improvident to blame United s defeat entirely on the whelpish left-back.
Most of the team did not disgrace themselves, but Paul Scholes played as though he had been up all night drinking white spirits, while it is possible that Beckham s anaemic display was the result of being confronted by what appeared to be a taller version of his wife wearing the number six shirt for Real Madrid.
The doppelgdnger in question, Fernando Redondo, laid on the third goal with perhaps the finest piece of individual skill displayed by an opponent at Old Trafford since Wanchope scored that goal for Derby three years ago, backheeling the ball around two players to set himself up near the byline.
It was the sort of voodoo United might have done with a little more of on the night. When not trying to shoulder the door down with repeated high crosses and wing-and-a-prayer shots from long range, they got most change out of Real by picking the lock with careful through balls and patient probing around the 18-yard box.
But the enduring image of the night was not that of Iberian enterprise or Silvestrian ineptitude, but of Fergie standing on the sidelines, emasculated and powerless to do anything about the carnage unfolding on the pitch, his face resembling that of a post-witness-box Frank Dunlop.
And in the end, the final word went not to ITV s Clive Tyldesley (who, for some unfathomable reason, started drivelling on about Pokimon characters when Madrid brought on Nicolas Anelka as a substitute), but to the irrepressible George Hamilton, who unburdened himself of the following with about 25 minutes to go:
Madrid are like a rabbit dazed in the headlights of a car . . . except this rabbit has a suit of armour, in the shape of two precious away goals."
Never mind, George. If I'd spent my formative years watching Cliftonville in the 1950s, I'd be talking like that too.