The match cannot heal or mend but it can remind us that humanity endures
HE would have heard the noise from his penthouse at The Lowry, the muffled explosion. Technically, Jose Mourinho resides in Salford. He’s that side of the River Irwell, on the bank that looks across to the centre of town.
Yet he’s a Manchester man, in essence. He walks, paparazzi permitting, across the Trinity Bridge to his favourite city centre restaurants. The view through his window is of the city.
Sir Alex Ferguson lived in Cheshire’s golden triangle; so do most of the players at the Manchester clubs. But Mourinho is embedded in the urban centre. His accommodation may be temporary, but his location is a tenminute walk from Manchester’s heart of darkness; the place where a despicable individual, Salman Abedi, ended so many young lives, including his own.
Across from Manchester Arena is England’s National Football Museum, a nod to the city’s contribution to the game. It used to be in Preston, but too few visited.
The world comes to Manchester these days. Mourinho is evidence of that, Pep Guardiola too. For tourists, Old Trafford is as high on the itinerary as the Tower of London. When news of the tragedy broke, it was football that would have placed it on so many mental maps across the planet. Everyone knows Manchester. It is where United, and City, come from. It is famous for football now.
That solemn picture of the silence before training yesterday, the images of the players walking quietly, respectfully, around the Friends Arena in Stockholm, show a club trying to come to terms with its duty, its responsibility on such a day.
No doubt Mourinho, and the executive staff, agonised about whether he should speak publicly on the eve of the Europa League final; about whether there were any words that would not sound trite, or contrived — like all those defiant speeches that are our only response to the wickedness of shrapnel, the horrid scenes of human devastation.
Mourinho, maybe not alone, decided he could not go through with it. He would deliver a prepared statement, but not answer questions from the floor. Maybe he feared being asked about the mundanities of tactics, team selection or sporting ambition, at a time when parents waited anguished for news, yet feared for worse if it came.
That is understandable. Mourinho has a young family, too. He has children in the age demographic of pop concerts and festivals. Like the rest of us, he will have felt immediate empathy, imagined the dread of waiting, or the unbearable agony of not knowing.
Perhaps he simply did not feel qualified to speak on behalf of a city, having resided there less than a year.
Maybe he thought others could say it better, and with the right vowels. Proper Mancs. The sort who rushed on to social media on Monday night, extending a bed, or a brew, to any who needed it. Maybe Mourinho did not feel best equipped to offer the equivalent of tea and sympathy.
This is a pity, in its way. Mourinho is an intelligent, eloquent man; an emotional man, too. He doesn’t always channel those emotions as the world wants, but he is no philistine. He would have found the words, if required.
He may yet, when the match is done. Nobody should judge, either way. He was employed to win football matches, and trophies, not heal a city or a nation at its moment of greatest sadness.
Yet, in his own way, he has played his part. Inadvertently, coincidentally, without ever imagining the significance at the time — indeed, how could he — he has done his bit for Manchester.
Not like a first responder. Nobody would compare a sideshow event to practical aid on the ground. Yet United’s presence in Stockholm, to play something as seemingly inconsequential as a football match, stands as defiance of sorts. It is civic pride, in its way. And while it is meaningless compared to the loss felt by individuals, it smacks of a certain spirit, a certain individuality, a certain way. A Mancunian way.
MOURINHO had a choice. Come fourth, or try to win a European trophy. Either route took his club to the Champions League. And Mourinho chose the trophy. He did not play safe. From a long way out, he decided that United’s history dictated the pursuit of glory. And, right now, the city needs that. It needs a standard to rally around — red or blue. One imagines even United’s most bitter rivals will be willing them on tonight.
Mourinho was criticised for his decision. It was thought he could have gone for both — league position and European trophy. Maybe he could. That really is an argument for another day; a day when the nuances of football strategy will feel relevant again.
Yet by targeting the trophy, Mourinho has given Manchester this match. And while it cannot heal or mend or solve or erase, it can serve as some small aidememoire, a gentle nudge that humanity endures, and achieves, and comes together. And, as the late Jo Cox MP said, we have far more in common with each other than things that divide us.
Football is among them, as trivial as this may seem. James Corden reeled off another list of trivialities in his tribute to Manchester on Monday night. Comedy. Curries. Community. Character. Incredible music. Great football teams. He was speaking of Manchester, but it could have been anywhere.
Every city thinks it has those qualities. Every city has those qualities. There is nowhere on earth where terror could have struck and it would not have been met with the same kindness and strength in adversity.
It would have been a recognisable story in Liverpool, Glasgow, Newcastle, your town, my town.
Some may think UEFA should have called this game off tonight, that it would have been respectful and proper. Yet that would have been to deny our universality, to refute our connection, however shallow this may appear in the face of brutal and nihilistic wrong.
Tonight, in Stockholm, two groups of young men, of many nationalities and faiths, watched by people from around the world, who also know many differences, will share a common experience. And although some will be divided by the outcome, it’ll be a harmless division.
And that is why it is right for the game to go ahead.
Not for them, because nothing can be done for them, the innocents, the gone, those left behind to grieve. It goes ahead for us; for what we have in common; to help us across an awful divide, as small as the Trinity Bridge, if we wish it to be.