Chapter 140: Best Goalkeeper

What impression had Southampton always given? Surely nobody could have missed it.

Southampton had long been known as a club that was good at producing young players, a reputation that stretched back decades and was still going strong. Their academy had given the game the likes of Gareth Bale, Theo Walcott and Luke Shaw, and every few years another bright young thing came off the same conveyor belt.

The current side was no exception. In goal stood Sam Hartigan, who had just been called up to the England squad for the first time. At the back was the Czech left-back Tomas Vrba. In midfield were Diego Salgado and Kieran Moat. Up front was Jordan Kell, a striker a bigger club would clearly come for sooner or later.

Beyond those names there was the Danish winger Rasmus Holm, and the canniness of the Southampton selling machine was beginning to show. Barcelona had once wanted to bring the Dane to the Camp Nou and had offered ten million pounds. Southampton had calmly asked for twenty, and had scared Barcelona off completely.

Clearly, Southampton drove a hard bargain, and perhaps one day they would drive too hard a bargain and regret it. For the time being, though, nobody was laughing at them.

For this match Saint had picked the sturdiest line he had at the back, putting Barzley alongside Teale. The decision was not entirely a free one. Southampton’s two centre-forwards put a great deal of emphasis on physical strength, and a smaller pair of defenders would have been eaten alive.

Alongside Kell, Southampton had a German striker named Lukas Brandt in the front line. He did not score many goals, but he was famous for his sheer physical impact, and defenders hated playing against him.

Southampton’s midfield was Salgado, Moat, Ollie Benning and Holm. The back four was Rui Barata, Tom Haverty, Vrba and Wes Tilbrook.

For Villa, Vacek was the one man who could not be moved. The defence was Faraday, Teale, Barzley and Colley, and this match needed Colley’s height more than most.

The midfield and the front line were unchanged. Reyes partnered Conlan in the middle, Rocher and Jurek went out wide, and Tomlin and Pryce led the attack.

"Goodness me, Villa don’t seem to have been affected by the storm of the last match at all, because the players have come out like a storm themselves!" Villa’s opening attack surprised a good many people.

And that was without their manager, who was sitting in the stands. Southampton were never a pushover. Since Neil Gresham had taken over two seasons earlier, the club had seemed to light up again, and the reason Gresham had landed the job in the first place was the great work he had done at Chelsea’s academy the year before.

Reyes carried the ball over the halfway line, then played it to Pryce. Southampton reacted at once, and Moat rushed at Pryce for the first time, looking to steal the ball.

The experienced Pryce was never going to give Moat that chance. A diagonal pass found Tomlin, though Tomlin was not ready to take it on himself.

On the right, Jurek was flying forward at speed, only to run into another Czech, his international teammate Vrba.

It was no exaggeration to say that this match was eagerly awaited in the Czech Republic, since it is not often that two Czech players are seen lining up against each other in the Premier League.

Compared with the other storm, of course, that was nothing. The previous match against Chelsea had caused huge controversy in the newspapers.

There were fans who thought Saint was in the wrong, who felt he had embarrassed the club and damaged the image of English management. Most people still supported him, though, because Strickland’s spitting could no longer be passed off as mere disrespect; it was an insult. If Saint had been expected to swallow it, then that would have been the real embarrassment.

Then, under Whitlock’s skilful hand, the mood of the public turned completely. Once the argument became one about how the game treated its managers, it was a problem for the whole country, and even the sports minister’s office felt obliged to ask the Football Association some hard questions. Strickland’s heavy punishment was linked to all of that.

Saint, naturally, had not been harassed much in those days. As for the press, he had carefully picked a handful of friendly outlets and given interviews only to them.

Handling the media was the easy part. The truly difficult thing was his family. His aunt phoned constantly, and even his cousin, who was in the middle of army basic training at Catterick, had asked his sergeant for permission to call Saint several times.

On the pitch, Jurek was fast, but Vrba was not slow, and the two knew each other very well. The first duel ended in Vrba’s favour.

Villa’s attack did not stall, though. The ball came to Colley’s feet, and he knocked it forward to Conlan, who combined with Pryce.

"It’s a decoy! Conlan’s play with Pryce is a decoy, because Villa’s real attack is down the left, and the man is Frenchman Antoine Rocher!"

While Conlan and Pryce drew in the Southampton defenders, Pryce slipped a diagonal pass out to the byline on the left.

Number seven. It was Rocher’s new number this season, and since he had taken it, seven had become the favourite shirt number among Villa supporters.

"Pass or take him on?" The Frenchman’s personal ability had been on display in the first few games, especially against Chelsea, where he had gone past one of the league’s best defenders as if the man were not there.

If it were not for the fight between Saint and Strickland, Rocher’s performances would surely have been the headline in the papers.

Even so, his form was more than enough to attract attention from other clubs, in particular from the Daily Courier, which was always uncomfortable about Saint. According to Whitlock’s information, thanks to the Courier’s tireless digging, Arsenal had started sending scouts to watch Villa.

"Go on, go on, Tilbrook can’t stop Rocher at all!" Before Rocher was inside the area, Tilbrook looked like a plank of wood.

"Pass! No, Rocher has played it across! Tomlin! The header!"

"Hartigan! Hartigan! The Southampton goalkeeper makes a wonderful save!" Tomlin’s header was aimed at the bottom right corner, almost a certain goal.

But Hartigan’s astonishing reading of the shot and his outstanding reaction kept Tomlin’s header out. It was a save that justified his place in the squad.

It was said that, in the end, the young keeper who had settled into the first team last season and played so often this season would finish the year talked about alongside Vacek as one of the best goalkeepers in the country.

The ball ran behind for a corner, and Villa Park groaned as one. Down on the touchline Cadman put both hands on his head, and Pratt, beside him, shook his fist at the sky as though the sky were to blame. On the pitch Tomlin knelt on the grass for a moment, staring at the post he had been so sure of, and Rocher jogged over and ruffled his hair.

"Next one," the Frenchman said in his accented English. "Next one goes in."

Southampton, for their part, had the look of a side that had been given a gift. Hartigan was already on his feet, clapping his defenders back into shape, and Gresham in the visitors’ technical area nodded once, as if he had expected nothing less.

In the Holte End, Saint’s left hand twitched at his side, and one of the officials turned slowly towards him.

"I was just stretching," Saint said, perfectly calmly.

Behind him, Danny grinned and pretended not to hear. The chef from Hattie’s, who had been holding his breath, let it out all at once with a noise like a punctured tyre.