Playing the Moldovans At Tennis (19 page)

My audience laughed. I liked it here. Five young women, all with a well-developed sense of fun, and all up for giving me a helping hand with my quest. Just like the Journalism Centre had been in Chisinau, this office would be the headquarters for my operations, the difference here being that I'd be surrounded by people taking an active interest and making positive suggestions.

Why don't you call the Irish FA?' suggested Mary. 'They'll tell you where Rogaciov is staying.'

'Good idea, do you have the number?'

'Ah sure, we'll have it for you in a second.'

This was just amazing. I was surrounded by professional researchers. As far as they were concerned, problems were there to be solved. Something of a contrast to my recent Moldovan experiences.

Rogaciov was the problem which needed solving. Since the Wembley game he'd been dropped from the senior national side but he was still playing for the Under 21s. Their match was taking place at another time and in another part of Northern Ireland. Just as yet, I was unfamiliar with his itinerary. Over the phone, Trevor Irskine at the Irish FA was to provide me with all the answers.

The seniors play on Wednesday night as you know,' explained the helpful Trevor, who at this stage believed himself to be chatting with a reporter from Ulster Television. 'But Rogaciov will be running out with the Under 21s tomorrow night in Coleraine.'

'Right. Well, I'll definitely come to that.'

'No problem – I'll arrange tickets. Why exactly is it you want to interview him anyway?'

'It's a very long story Trevor – if it's all right I'll explain when I see you.'

'No problem.'

I liked this guy. Everything appeared to be
no problem.
Perhaps that was because he didn't know exactly what I wanted from him yet.

'His name is Andrei Ixari,' I said to the pretty receptionist at the Holiday Inn. 'He's expecting me. He's the translator for the Moldovan national team.'

'Ah yes, Andrei,' she replied with a smile. 'I'll call him for you now. He's lovely.'

This I knew already. He'd probably been the most co-operative of all the people I'd met connected with Moldovan football. Now it seemed his good manners and boyish good looks were winning friends among pretty Northern Irish receptionists.

Andrei must have been wondering why I'd still bothered to come all the way to Belfast given the rather unsympathetic nature of the last message from the national team coach. When we'd spoken on the phone a few hours earlier, he'd been in the middle of a meeting and I hadn't been able to explain my proposed solution to this. If Andrei didn't have me down as a genuine British eccentric just yet, then surely that would change the moment I explained that I'd travelled all the way to Belfast to play three Moldovan footballers at Play Station tennis.

It was good to see his face again as he marched proudly from the lifts to the lounge area where I was waiting for him. He was flanked by the large amiable figure of Vasile Vatamanu. They both looked surprisingly pleased to see me.

Welcome to the United Kingdom,' I offered, rather formally.

Mr Vatamanu said something in Romanian.

'It is really great to see you here at your home,' translated Andrei, dutifully.

Belfast wasn't my home, but I knew what was meant, and we all shook hands warmly. The two men seemed so relaxed, it was quite extraordinary. Naturally, having only flown in that day they would have been excited about being in a new land, but I wondered if they were experiencing a sense of ease at being free from the burden that was Moldova. I reckoned so. It was in their expressions. It was almost as if their facial muscles were warmed up and ready to break into a smile.

Our meeting was infused with uncharacteristic laughter, Mr Vatamanu being in jocular mood. He was the bearer of good news. Stunningly good, in fact. It was explained that the national trainer had changed his mind yet again and now he had no objection to my taking on his players at tennis, provided it was done the following morning. Naturally enough I agreed. I was hardly going to say 'No, I've set tomorrow morning aside for window shopping.'

I wasn't going to have very long. The two games against Stroenco and Curtianu would have to be played after their breakfast and before their sightseeing tour. This would mean fitting it in between 10.15 and 11.00.

'Will there be enough time?' I asked Mr Vatamanu, whose response was immediate.

'Mr Vatamanu says,' interpreted Andrei, 'that in this time you will be able to beat the players three times over!'

Mr Vatamanu let out a huge roar of laughter.

'Beating them once will be enough,' I returned with a smile.

Some things you want to do twice. Beating Moldovan footballers at tennis wasn't one of them.

'Are you fit and ready?' enquired Shonagh, as we met in the reception of UTV the next morning.

'I'm as ready as I'm ever going to be, and as fit as I need to be.'

Shonagh had kindly agreed to perform the role which Iulian had done in Moldova, and film the matches as evidence.

Leaving the taxi waiting outside, ready to whisk us off to the Belfast indoor tennis centre, we entered the Holiday Inn at exactly 10.15 am. The atmosphere was unusual, to say the least. Middle-aged Moldovan men were milling around the foyer wearing dark overcoats and a variety of inappropriate hats. It felt like I was back in Chisinau, except that the light wasn't dingy and the staff in the hotel didn't look like they'd just been sentenced to death. The milling men, I assumed, were team officials. There were far too many of them and, as I was soon to discover, they all wanted their say in the decisionmaking process.

'God, it's like a scene from a Cold War thriller,' said a stunned Shonagh.

'I had three weeks of this.'

'Rather you than me.'

Andrei finally appeared looking a little harassed. He explained that the players were still finishing breakfast and they'd be with me soon. It was now 10.20 and they were supposed to be back at the hotel having completed the games by 11.00. Time was tight, but I was powerless to hurry things along. Even though I was back on territory where I spoke the language and understood how to make things happen, I was still reliant on the good will of my Moldovan friends, and subject to their capricious and vacillating dispositions.

The foyer became even busier now that track-suited footballers were added to the ranks of those busily doing nothing in the hotel's reception area.

This must mean that they've finished breakfast,' I remarked, as coolly as I could.

'It's twenty-five past ten,' observed Shonagh. 'I don't think you're going to have time to fit this in.'

The important thing is not to panic in this situation. It'll all come together.'

My confident words belied my inner fears. This was all slipping away. If the games didn't get played this morning then that was it. No other available times.

What's happening Andrei?' I asked as he moved past looking a little flustered.

'I will be with you in a moment,' he said. There is a problem that needs to be resolved.'

And with those words he joined a confabulation of officials, who were doing a great job of looking like Eastern European spies. Voices were raised, opinions declared, and arms waved about. They appeared to be discussing something of a calamitous nature. Shonagh looked across to me.

'Something bad has happened,' she said, gravely.

'I know. It's bit of a worry.'

For the next few minutes, as the crisis meeting before us continued, Shonagh and I speculated on the possible reasons for all this anxiety. Had their star player been injured? Had there been a break-in to one of the rooms? Had the Moldovan government been on the phone with some complicated diplomatic diversions?

Whatever the predicament, Andrei was dispatched to deal with it. I watched anxiously as this fraught figure made his way across the foyer for the umpteenth time in search of a solution. I took a moment to pray that whatever had been the cause for this exigency, it could be cleared up in the next thirty seconds.

Grimly, Andrei flagged down a passing waitress. We craned our necks to hear as much as we could.

What is happening about the sausages?' he asked.

'I thought your man said that you didn't want sausages,' she replied.

That was Mr Cepoi. Mr Danileant wishes for there to be sausages now.'

'OK. I'll go and get the sausages again.'

Andrei looked across to the huddle of spies and gave them the thumbs up. Their looks of concern appeared to be assuaged somewhat.

Shonagh and I shared a look of disbelief. It seemed scarcely plausible that disruption on this scale had been caused by little more than a lack of sausages. It would have been hilarious, had the consequences of the delay not been so crucial to the outcome of my wager.

Moments later the waitress emerged from the kitchens, and held a large tray of sausages in front of Andrei.

'Sausages,' she said, routinely.

'Yes, sausages,' confirmed Andrei, before ushering her in the direction of the officials.

We all watched anxiously to see if this body of men would accept them as sausages or whether one or two of them would demand scientific corroboration.

We were in luck. The waitress was greeted with a succession of approving nods and she was dispatched to the dining room followed by a line of hungry, track-suited footballers, relieved that the contents of their breakfast had finally been approved. The sausage crisis, it seemed, was over.

It was an agonising further five minutes before Andrei and Mr Vatamanu finally emerged from the dining room with two footballers alongside them.

We are ready now,' said Andrei. This is Alexandru Curtianu and this is Sergei Clescenco.'

The players shook hands with me, obediently.

'Mr Vatamanu says that you must go now to play tennis,' stated Andrei firmly. 'He wants the players to be back here by eleven.'

However, now it was my turn to have a problem, and it was a bigger one than sausages.

'Andrei,' I said, as the two footballers made their way out of the hotel, 'I think Mr Vatamanu has brought me the wrong Sergei.'

What do you mean?'

Well, to win my bet I have to beat the eleven footballers who played in the Wembley match. Sergei Clescenco didn't, but Sergei Stroenco did.'

'Ah, you want
Stroenco?'

Yes.'

Andrei suddenly looked flustered and went into an immediate conference with Mr Vatamanu before conveying the news to a bemused Clescenco, whose look of disappointment suggested that he'd been rather looking forward to this brief sporting diversion. Given the difficult nature of getting Moldovan footballers on to a tennis court, it felt rather odd to turn one down when he was on offer, but it needed to be the right one or it meant nothing at all.

Clescenco sulked his way off, managing what appeared to be a dirty look before disappearing behind the closing lift doors. It felt cruel, but business was business. Admittedly, on the presentation of my evidence to Arthur, it would have been unlikely that that he would have said, 'Hey, wait a minute! That wasn't Stroenco – that was Clescenco!' Nevertheless, having come this far it seemed important to do things properly.

Amazingly my Moldovan friends seemed to agree, and minutes later another track-suited footballer was paraded before me.

'Sergei Stroenco,' announced a proud Vasile Vatamanu, pointing to the bewildered, slightly balding young man in a track suit, who presumably had just been plucked from breakfast and told that he had to go and play some bloke at tennis.

We shook hands and I thanked him for his time, before ushering everyone out to the awaiting taxi. It was 10.40 am. Supposedly I had twenty minutes to complete the whole procedure. Of course, it was impossible, but as long as no-one else had realised that, there seemed little to be gained from pointing it out.

Mr Vatamanu looked positively excited by the proceedings as he eased himself into the taxi's spacious and comfortable front seat. There was no such luxury for the four of us who were struggling into the limited space just behind him. Curtianu, Stroenco and I snuggled in along the back seat while Shonagh, the valiant camera woman, spread herself across our laps. This did not seem to displease the footballers who were now beaming broadly.

Huddled in the back of the car as it hurried us to our sporting destination, I felt a sudden swell of pride. Here I was, wedged between the Moldovan team captain and the big stalwart of the defence, surely on the brink of adding their tennis scalps to an already impressive list. I was
doing
this. Little more than ten minutes ago it had seemed a distant prospect, but the sausage crisis was behind us and victory was once again within sight.

Despite being unable to serve at my normal pace because of a painfully sore right thumb, I encountered little difficulty in overcoming my Moldovan opposition, who offered predictably meagre resistance. Stroenco covered the court quite well for a big defender, but had clearly suffered from the lack of time he'd had to mentally prepare for the big game. This, coupled with a tendency to miss the ball completely with his racket, proved to be his downfall. Curtianu, reckoned to be the best footballer in the team, fell some way short of being the best tennis player, and this proved to be his.

Thus two more downfalls were safely in the bag, as Shonagh and I delivered the players back to their hotel, only twenty minutes behind their schedule.

Thank you for the game,' said the extraordinarily polite and charming Curtianu, as he bade me farewell outside the Holiday Inn. 'And good luck.'

You too,' I replied. 'I hope you win the big match tomorrow night – I'll be supporting you.'

Curtianu smiled and gave me the thumbs up.

A most impressive thumb, I noted. I was a little relieved that I hadn't been required to take it on at Play Station tennis.

'Can I travel up to the Under 21 match in Coleraine with all of you, on your coach?' I asked Andrei, back in reception at the Holiday Inn, adopting the
if you don't ask, you don't get
approach, as advocated by Big Jim back in Moldova.

'I will ask Mr Vatamanu,' he replied.

I was fairly confident of success. Mr Vatamanu definitely liked me now. Just twenty minutes earlier he'd given me a small lapel badge bearing the emblem of the Moldovan national side. I cannot imagine there is a more sure-fire way of knowing that you've been embraced in a Moldovan's affections.

This is no problem,' Andrei said on his return. The coach is leaving from here at 4.30.'

And so it was that at 4.20 pm I was wandering aimlessly around the reception area of the Holiday Inn, just as I had done for an extremely fraught half hour, earlier that very same day. I was more relaxed now – until, that was, I got the shock of a lifetime. Over by the lifts, I saw a familiar figure in a dark coat and wearing a flat cap more indicative of Yorkshire than Moldova. I focused on the face.
That
face. Although it was not frightening in itself, it still sent a shiver down my spine and into my pants, where it put my bowels on general alert. I was looking at my nemesis. Grigorii Corzun. Arsehole of the Universe. My sworn enemy.

Without thinking, and before I could be recognised, I rushed to the toilets where I intended to gather my thoughts and decide what to do. I closed the cubicle door, dropped my trousers, sat down, and commenced deliberation. I took solace in the fact that if a solution to my predicament was to be found then surely I was in the best place to find it. On the loo. Isn't this where all the truly great thinking is done? Wasn't it here that Galileo worked out the constancy of the time of a pendulum's swing? Wasn't it here that Boyle finally declared the volume of a fixed quantity of gas at constant temperature is inversely proportional to its pressure? Of course it was. If you ask me, this had been where Sir Isaac Newton actually discovered gravity. The apple story has just been the version of events which have been sanitised for public consumption. After all, it does make far more palatable reading in a children's text book if Newton's moment of enlightenment arrived when an apple hit him on the head rather than as a result of the splashes produced by number twos in the toilet bowl. One version suggests that Newton was a great inspirational thinker and the other that he got lucky when his bowels were playing up.

Being on the loo definitely seemed like the right place to be. Apart from anything else, it was an appropriate facility on which to be seated given my fearful state of mind. I sat there, like Fagin in
Oliver Twist,
reviewing the situation. Not far from where I was
relaxing,
Grigorii Corzun was waiting in the foyer of the hotel, no doubt about to board the same coach to Coleraine as I was intending to take. This, I knew, was not good, not least because Grigorii Corzun bore no similarities to Vasile Vatamanu. He wasn't plump, he wasn't very nice, and he didn't like me.
At all.
His last words to me, delivered via Iulian, had not been of a complimentary nature. On the contrary, he'd been angry that I'd drunk his brandy, refused to stay at his hotel, and shown little enthusiasm for becoming his business partner.

But, I reminded myself, what did I have to fear? What could he do? He was hardly likely to have me killed. (Although should he have chosen that course, we were in a part of the world where practitioners in this skill weren't that hard to find.) I suppose what was really bothering me was that he could scupper the whole ship. Should he so desire he could badmouth me to the relevant managers, trainers or officials, and I would be
persona non grata
from here on in, and be refused access to Sergei Rogaciov, the one remaining player I still required who fell within Moldovan jurisdiction.

I reached a decision, and I left the lavatories knowing that I had to follow the courageous course. I hadn't done anything wrong or behaved dishonourably, so why had I been skulking around in the karsy? If he decided to make things difficult for me then so be it. I wasn't going to run away from this one.

In the foyer I saw that Grigorii Corzun was in conversation with two silly-hatted men. Taking a deep breath, I approached him as boldly as I could, head held high and proud, in a position designed to say 'I am strong and I am not frightened', even though I wasn't and I was, respectively. My plan was to embarrass him by being overly nice. I would offer my hand in friendship and he would be made to feel distinctly uncomfortable. A slightly eccentric method of getting even, but more than good enough for me. In my view, killing someone with kindness is always a better option than killing them with a shotgun. It's less messy, entirely legal, and you feel much better afterwards. I don't know why it isn't favoured more often.

'Hello Mr Corzun, it's nice to see you again,' I said politely, arm extended with hand proffered for shaking purposes.

The Transnistrian turned to see who was addressing him and was staggered by the sight before him. Surely not? The persistent Englishman had followed the players to Belfast?

'Hello,' he replied, managing to change
aghast
into
awkward smile.

It seemed like he was completely unable to gauge which emotions he ought to be feeling, but I reckoned he was experiencing something between sheepish and uncomfortable. Good. No more than he deserved, given the way he'd treated me back on his patch.

Then the most wonderful thing happened. Mr Vatamanu, on his way from the lifts to the hotel's revolving doors, broke short his journey so that he could give me a big friendly pat on the back. He made a comment in Russian to Corzun, which although incomprehensible, I knew was about me, and felt sure was wholly complimentary. Mr Vatamanu moved off, giving me a comradely wave. Corzun looked both hurt and bewildered. Whatever his feelings towards me might have been, they now had to be tempered by the fact that I had the approbation of the PR officer of the Moldovan National Team. Corzun looked a little nervous. He was just a club man after all, and his presence on foreign jaunts like this one probably depended on an invitation from the Moldovan Football Federation. Could he be worried that I might tell them the story of his behaviour towards me in Transnistria? Could it be that the balance of power had shifted and that I was now the one to be feared?

Oh, I did hope so. It may not be gentlemanly to hit a man when he is down, but I couldn't resist it.

'I beat your player Stroenco yesterday,' I said, wallowing in this brief moment of glory.

Corzun smiled, and shuffled from side to side awkwardly.

'Goodbye then,' I said, suddenly remembering that we shared no common language and that any further digs would be lost on him anyway.

'Goodbye,' he managed with a feeble smile.

As I walked away, in my head I read out the final score:

I sat at the back of the coach. Not because I had any desire to do any singing or smoking (things which, in my youth, had been compulsory when sitting at the back) but because I felt like an intruder among all these middle-aged officials, and I thought it better to keep a low profile than risk being ejected. I didn't want to give Grigorii Corzun, who was seated at the front, any opportunity to avenge his foyer humiliation.

As the Belfast rain pounded against the coach windows, I settled into my seat, relieved that the journey to the Under 21 match was going to be this easy, but a little concerned about what was going to happen once I got there. Earlier that day, as a result of information gleaned over the phone from Trevor Irskine at the Irish FA, I'd booked myself into the same hotel that the Moldovan team were staying in that night. My hope was that I would be able to play Sergei Rogaciov some time the following day, but acquiring the necessary permission wasn't going to be easy because the Under 21 team were run by an entirely different set of officials, none of whom knew anything about my intentions.

The coach delivered us through the main gates of the Show-grounds, the venue for tonight's game, and the Moldovan posse alighted to witness the damp coolness of the county Londonderry evening. They all headed straight for the hot dog stand. My initial impulse was to sneak around the back of the stall and advise the vendor to revise his prices for Grigorii Corzun, explaining that this was a man who'd once paid twenty-five pounds for a beer and a sandwich in Manchester.

I bought a programme, and found myself a seat in the stands, in readiness for the big game. As the players warmed up, I picked out the number eleven shirt of Sergei Rogaciov, and I was impressed by his balance and movement. I wanted him to have a good game tonight, but most of all I wanted him to avoid being carried off on a stretcher.

The players lined up for the two national anthems. This was the first time I'd heard the Moldovan one, and I decided that it had quite a nice little tune, but nonetheless I was keeping my fingers crossed that I would never have to sing it. Then the band struck up with the anthem for the Northern Ireland team. I was surprised by its familiarity. I knew it well. Of course I did– it was 'God Save the Queen'.

I had never seen a crowd stand and sing this mediocre song with such gusto and heart, but then I suppose this was because I had never been anywhere before where its rendition meant so much. In this part of the world, your attitude to this piece of music depended on from which half of the sectarian divide you heralded.

I don't normally stand for the national anthem, given that I'm not sure that I approve of what
it
stands for, but on this occasion I felt that not to do so might have incurred the wrath of those around me. Cravenly I rose to my feet and sang the mindless words.

God save our gracious Queen
Long live our noble Queen
God save the Queen

Why
should
God save the Queen? Certainly ahead of anyone else. Were we suggesting that there ought to be some kind of pecking order for God's protective hand? If so, what number was I going to come in at?

1. The Queen

2. Sir Cliff Richard

3. Tony Hawks

Maybe not. I'd surely lose third place to Dana, on appeal.

I felt that given the amount of interest the Queen was going to show in the outcome of this particular encounter between the Moldovan and Northern Irish Under 21s, she could have been safely omitted from the proceedings. However, a glance over my shoulder told me that it was probably advisable not to share this view with those around me. Instead, knowing that football crowds are a generic group of whom it is generally wise to stay on the right side, I begrudgingly played the role of patriotic royalist.

The match was largely uneventful and it ended in a 1-1 draw. Rogaciov didn't score, but neither did he get injured. So far so good. I took a cab back to the country club hotel, checked into my rather luxurious room, and relaxed and waited. At 10.30 pm I put in an appearance at the bar.

'Do you know if any of the Moldovans are back from the game?' I asked a man perched on a bar stool, assuming that everyone knew that this was where the team were staying.

The man, who was making healthy inroads into a pint of Guinness, responded with characteristic Irish bonhomie.

'Ah sure, they're back all right. They're all taking a meal in the other bar,' he said. 'Why do you want to know?'

I hesitated.

'Er, well it's a little complicated.'

The man eyed me thoughtfully.

'You're not
Tony
are you?'

'Yes, I am,' I replied, rather taken aback. Tony Hawks to be precise.'

'Jeez, I was talking to you on the phone earlier. I'm Trevor Irskine.'

Trevor. Hello.'

We shook hands.

'Pull yourself a stool up. I'll get you a pint.'

Trevor was good company, not least because he and I shared the same problem. We both had to deal with the world of Moldovan football on a daily basis.

'My job is to look after them while they're here,' he said. 'Get them what they want, arrange the training facilities, organise sightseeing tours and all that kind of stuff. The problem is that four people are in charge, and every time a decision needs to be taken one of them says yes and three of them say no. It makes my job bloody impossible.'

He looked both frustrated and jaded, and he'd only been with the squad for two days. I resisted the temptation to tell him the full duration of my Moldovan sojourn.

'Yes, they can be difficult,' I understated.

'Difficult? I'd say.'

He took a swig of beer instead of saying what was immediately running through his head.

The worst thing,' he went on, when the beer had hit its mark and provided a suitably soothing effect. 'Is that they think I'm bloody spying on them.'

'How come?'

Well they've still got this Cold War mentality which means that they don't trust me. They think that I'm going to relay information back to the Northern Ireland squad about their training and their tactics. They have these little secret meetings up in room 30 when they don't want me to know what's going on. It's annoying, cos all I want is for them to have a good time.'

'I don't think having a good time is on their agenda.'

'I think you're right. What's frustrating is, individually they're all really nice, but collectively they're a pain in the arse.'

Two pints later we were still chatting, the most pleasing aspect of our conversation being the extent to which Trevor was prepared to embrace the cause of Hawks v Rogaciov.

'Don't worry, Tony, leave it with me,' he said, just before I turned in for the night. 'I'll talk to the necessary people in a minute and I'll make sure you play that guy some time tomorrow.'

The plan was very simple. Play Rogaciov after breakfast before the team left for their sightseeing tour of the Antrim coast. However, morning brought customary inconsistency from the Moldovan camp.