JE M'APPELLE KALVIN - The Square Ball 23/6/22
Paris Summer
Written by: David Guile
There always comes a moment when the elephant in the room is
impossible to ignore. You can try to carry on as normal if you like. At some
point, though, you’re going to be forced to acknowledge that something is
blocking the sunlight, there’s a random tusk poking you in the back and the
smell of pachyderm shit is making your morning coffee less than enjoyable. It’s
finally time to face up to the fact that Kalvin Phillips probably won’t be a
Leeds United player for much longer.
That’s football, sadly. No matter how high you rise up the
food chain there’s always going to be an apex predator waiting to cannibalise
you while Jim White watches, gleefully narrating your club’s evisceration like
a ghoulish David Attenborough. Call it the Law of the Jungle, or the Circle of
Life, or whatever makes you feel better about it. At least it’s Manchester City
this time, rather than Norwich.
At least we’ve all assumed it’s going to be City. A new name
entered the picture at the weekend: Paris Saint-Germain, champions of France
and plaything of Nasser El-Khelaifi, a man so rich that his bank balance
resembles one of Phil Hay’s ‘GOOOOOOOOOOAL’ tweets. Whether the interest is
genuine or simply a case of Andrea Radrizzani calling in a favour to force
City’s hand, it has certainly made things more interesting. If it was up to me
(which, at the time of writing, it’s not) Kalvin wouldn’t be going anywhere.
But ask yourself, if Kalvin Phillips absolutely has to go, wouldn’t you rather
see him go to PSG than Manchester City? And if not, what in the holy name of
Gary McAllister is wrong with you?
I don’t know about you, but I’m going to need a bit of time
to get over this particular departure. It feels like one of those that’s never
quite going to heal — Batty to Blackburn, Smith to You-Know-Who, Hadi Sacko to
whoever it was (that last one might just be me). When you’ve just gone through
a break-up, amicable or not, the last thing you want to see is your ex
arm-in-arm with someone else. City are probably the least worst domestic
option, but I’d quite like to continue watching Match Of The Day without being
pushed close to tears by something other than the dubious quality of our
football. I don’t want to know what their fans — who will never love him like
we do, regardless of success — think of him. Far better for him to skip the country
entirely to give us a degree of separation.
Then there’s the destination: Paris. Kalvin Phillips, our
Kalvin Phillips, calling the City of Light his home. It’s almost as mad as
Marcelo Bielsa living in Wetherby. Just picture Kalvin dusting off his GCSE
French for an interview (“Je m’appelle Kalvin et j’aime jouer au football avec
mes amis Bill et Illan”) or pulling a face when someone orders escargots at a
Michelin star restaurant. If that doesn’t make you smile, you’re already dead
inside. Paris isn’t a bad place to be if you’re a 26 year old with money and a
sense of adventure, and it certainly beats finding yourself stuck in Alderley
Edge living next door to Sir Alex Whiskyface.
It’s a shame about the football club itself, a soulless husk
fuelled by Qatari gas, but that seems to be the price of success nowadays. PSG
might be part of a hideous trend of nouveau-riche clubs doing their level best
to make football unaffordable for everyone, but they’re no worse than City in
that regard, and were at least smart enough to distance themselves from the
doomed Super League project. And if that’s not enough to convince you, just
imagine the look on Marcelo Bielsa’s face when Kalvin Phillips, the player he
shaped into a world class defensive fulcrum, lines up alongside Lionel Messi
for the first time.
In truth, neither City nor PSG are a perfect option for
Kalvin, but neither is staying put. I’m of the opinion that letting both Kalvin
and Raphinha leave the club in the same summer would be asking for trouble, but
it can’t be denied that last season represented a step backwards for Leeds, and
that our development has not kept pace with Kalvin’s. Bielsa saw this day
coming and tried to prepare us for it.
“One day he will stop playing for Leeds,” Bielsa said in September
of last year. “And the way he does it will convert him to an idol forever. I
have a feeling. It’s intuition. I’m sure he would only leave if he sees the
link to the place he was born remains intact. He will know how to do this.”
That day now appears close at hand. Somewhere in Leeds, an
exit video is being prepared. It will show a wild-haired teenager stabbing in a
volley on his Elland Road debut and reacting with unrestrained glee. And then,
in the space of maybe three and a half minutes, we’ll watch him grow (via
several eye-catching haircuts) into the man he is today, and then there will be
much dabbing-of-eyes and blaming-of-hayfever.
If this is it, I’m just glad we got the chance to watch
Kalvin Phillips grow up. Phillips and Frazer Richardson aside, no recent
academy graduate has remained with the club beyond their 26th birthday. Most of
the O’Leary team were gone by the age of 24, to win trophies elsewhere.
Whatever trophies Phillips goes on to win in what remains of his career, his
first was lifted here in Leeds, and that means everything, both to us and to
him.
City sold their soul and I’m not entirely sure PSG ever had
one, but whoever employs Kalvin Phillips won’t just find themselves stronger on
the pitch, they’ll also be richer in warmth, humanity and Yorkshire wit. Maybe
they’ll value these things, and maybe they won’t. Either way, I hope they will
know how lucky they are.