Even Fatty Ma Gets Called the King of Football — Then He Can Only Be the Saint of Football!

2006/3/31 17:25:12

With the World Cup approaching, let's talk about football. Strangely, football geniuses are mostly fat — for example, Fatty Ma, Fatty Ga, Fatty Ru, and even Big Ronaldo insists on squeezing into the pile of fat geniuses. But there is one more, far above all of them — a singular fatty. If even Fatty Ma gets called the King of Football, then he can only be the Saint of Football! He himself knows this very well, which is why he said the one thing only he is qualified to say: "I am better than Maradona. Pele has a foul mouth!"

For him, Maradona being called the King of Football is not particularly laughable among many laughable things. When even Van Tall-Guy gets called the King of the Penalty Box, it simply proves that the so-called "king" is often a synonym for garbage. He needs no crown. All kings before him are so diminutive, because he is a Saint — transcending the mundane to reach sainthood. The mundane so-called kings are only fit to grovel at his feet!

For him, the Golden Boot has been in his pocket since age 20. Now, at 40, he is still the top scorer in the football kingdom's league. This year, his official match goal count is approaching one thousand. In the era of Big Mouth Pele, a thousand was already a terrifying number of goals. Now, with such tight defense and fierce competition, what a thousand means needs no further explanation.

Who is he? Anyone who asks such a question is not qualified to discuss football. Let me instead quote two classic assessments of him:

Old Robson: He is one of the most difficult people I have ever worked with, but he is also a genius the likes of which I have never encountered in my coaching career. I could not change him — I could only find ways to get along with him.

Cruyff: One morning after training, he came to me and said he wanted eight days off to go home for Carnival. I said: only if you score a hat trick against Real Madrid on Sunday. In the end, he really did score 3 goals in that match, and after the game he left for the airport without even saying goodbye.

"Give him one square meter of space and it's enough to change the entire match" — the one who said this was also Cruyff, a King of Football of the 1970s. And the one in this 1970s King's mouth gave himself this modest evaluation: "Of all players since 1970, I consider myself the best." In truth, the "since 1970" qualifier is probably superfluous.