GREEK TRAGEDY FOR HARRY
Defender pays huge price after spectacular naivety
IF Harry Maguire is “very keen on ancient Greek culture” as his defence counsel claimed yesterday, he will no doubt be familiar with Lachesis, the second goddess of fate.
In Greek mythology Lachesis measures the thread of life and chooses a person’s destiny from a myriad of possibilities.
As he ponders his appeal against the suspended sentence handed down, Maguire may be tempted to blame the Fates for the mess he finds himself in, a mess which has cost him his place in the England squad in the short term.
The fact is, though, that it was his own personal choice to go out on that fateful night in Mykonos.
Whatever the truth or otherwise of the claims against him – and a court has judged them to be valid – he is undeniably guilty of spectacular naivety.
Gareth Southgate spoke yesterday of the necessity for his squad to wind down after the intense post-lockdown Premier League programme with an unbroken year of football to come. He is right. But there are ways and means.
Maguire is not the only twentysomething Brit in the Greek islands to assume that must mean heavy late-night refuelling sessions on the town.
But much as he might have hoped they did, the same rules do not apply to high-profile footballers.
The overlap between being an international sportsman and a role model may be uncomfortable for those involved. That is particularly the case with being an England footballer. None of them will have grown up dreaming of being a good example to millions; they just wanted to fire home the winner for the Three Lions – or in Maguire’s case, nut a clearance header off the Wembley Arch. One comes with the other though; indeed, it is a part of the role Southgate has made a priority as he aimed to forge a closer bond between team and nation.
Ironically, Maguire was one of those who made the strongest contribution in doing so at the 2018 World Cup during England’s run to the semi-final in Russia.
Everyone bought into the Maguire story as the travelling fan with England at the 2016 Euros who was happy to pay to be in the stands at Sheffield United, the club where he started his career, right. ‘Slabhead’ was a footballing everyman – a black-booted, retrofit centre-half as grounded as they come. As such, he was one of the least likely candidates to find himself in this sort of scrape. Southgate could probably have named a full 11 of more likely candidates in his squad.
Has the mega-money move to Manchester United and the captaincy of one of the world’s biggest clubs changed him? Despite the ‘do you know who I am?’ cringeworthy line attributed to him by Greek police, those who know him closely say not.
But it only takes one misjudgment, one case of finding yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time and reacting the wrong way for everything to unravel.
Appeal or not, Maguire has been convicted. Southgate could not take him to Iceland.