A mix of the perfect footballer and the perfect alcoholic
No matter what age he was at the end, George would have died young, writes Declan Lynch
MAYBE it was just the 24-hour news coverage, but the last days of George Best were strangely reminiscent of the last days of another famous footballer who died this year, Pope John Paul II. It was a long goodbye, for the Protestant from east Belfast and the Catholic from Krakow.
Many icons of the 20th century died suddenly and violently, but with Bestie and the Pope, there was ample time for reflection, as their respective ordeals drew to a close.
There were echoes too in the language used, with the Vatican announcing that the Pope was already on his journey from this earth, while the redoubtable Professor Roger Williams told us that George was reaching the end of the long road.
Here were two men who had risen from nothing to dominate their world. In their prime, they had been the epitome of male accomplishment, figures of great prowess, and now on their death-beds they were creating equally powerful images of men fading away, exhausted by the struggle.
Though of course George’s journey had taken him through about 10,000 women, and 100,000 bars, whereas the Pope had been equally determined in his pursuit of whatever is the opposite of wine, women, and song.
And on that note, you might read some darkly humorous meaning into the Pontiff lingering at death’s door on April Fool’s Day, while George was preparing to check out on the day that 24-hour drinking was legalised in the UK.
In condemning that measure, Prof Williams found a way to remind us that it was the gargle which had wasted George. Throughout, Williams cut an admirable figure in his refusal to judge his wayward patient, declining all invitations to criticise Bestie for boozing on his second liver, and generally drinking himself to death. There was something splendidly old-school about this, the doctor sticking to his doctoring, and leaving the judging to those who are so inclined.
And now that it’s all over, who would judge George without first answering the question: did you envy him?
Obviously most normal men would envy George Best the great footballer, but an awful lot of us figure it wasn’t the worst life either, being George Best on the way down. It was perhaps the perfect life for an alcoholic, being able to look back drunkenly on your youth, when you were actually George Best.
Many alcoholics live on illusion, on the notion that there is greatness within them somewhere, and that the booze can maybe help to bring it out somehow. But if you were actually great, if it’s all out there already, then it must be extremely hard to rouse yourself to do something constructive with the rest of your days, other than supping vodka and orange juice at noon in your local, as you pore over the crossword.
Recovering alcoholics are supposed to embark on a process of change, at some fundamental level. But which of us would see the point of changing, if we could look in the mirror and see Bestie looking back at us, on the way out to the pub, the club, and maybe another lost weekend in some shady resort?
It was these extremes which made him such a compelling figure, the fact that he was both the perfect footballer and the perfect alcoholic. Bobby Charlton too was a very great player, but Bobby went on to lead a relatively normal life outside football, and thus we lost interest in him. Bobby took his responsibilities seriously; he was, in short, an adult.
George never grew up, which again made him perfect alcoholic material, but which also helped to make him so likeable. No matter what age he was at the end, George would have died young. If he had lived to be 95, we’d still be regarding him as the younger brother who went a bit astray.
Even the way he would pretend to be off the drink, when he was clearly on it, was so evidently ludicrous, you had to laugh. My own personal favourite, perhaps a landmark in the annals of alcoholic denial, was when George invited the cameras into his house in Portavogie, his retreat far away from the drinking dens of London, in which, astonishingly, he had installed a fully-stocked bar.
Full bar facilities, not for himself, you know, just in case his non-alcoholic friends dropped in. Just in case old Rodney Marsh happened to be knocking around Portavogie one day, and fancied a beer. George didn’t want to be any trouble, to anyone.
Yet he was not a remotely bad man, and while his own efforts to quit drinking were risible, right until the end he was reminding us of the downside, allowing a newspaper to print a picture of him when he was clearly dying.
“This is how it ends for guys like me” he seemed to be saying. And yet you could hear him following up with a characteristic Bestie chuckle, and the punchline: “And so what?”