As I sat down to compose last week’s catharsis of whichever football matter seemed most prevalent or noteworthy, my interest was piqued by the case and career of Babak Rafati. Don’t recognise the name? Whilst he may sound like a prodigious wunderkind, inevitably linked to a Premier League team, he is actually a 41-year-old German referee who last week attempted to take his own life just hours before he was set to officiate a Bundesliga game between Cologne and Mainz. Thankfully, his quick-thinking assistants managed to break into his hotel room and save him; he is now receiving treatment for depression.
This set me thinking on the pressures that those within the game face. Mr Rafati has admitted finding the burden of being a referee too much: the fear of making mistakes, the media pressure, the pressure to perform; constantly being scrutinised was too much. My mind immediately jumped to the case of Rafati’s compatriot Robert Enke, the German goalkeeper who, succumbing to the depression induced by the death of his two-year-old daughter Lara, tragically succeeded in his suicide attempt in December 2009, six months before he was set to be his country’s number one at the 2010 World Cup. He was 32.
The case of Justin Fashanu – the first black player to command a £1 million transfer fee – who hanged himself in a Shoreditch garage in 1998 is also very poignant. A young man struggling with continually being ostracised due to his race and homosexuality, Fashanu was also a very gifted footballer but, having openly admitted to being the first homosexual footballer, found himself an outcast.
Then, for further food for thought, there was also the factor of physical pressures that footballers face: just days before the case of Rafati came to light, there had been the mid-match sudden-death of 30-year-old Bobsam Elejiko, who collapsed and died during a fifth division game in Belgium. He joins, to name but a few, Antonio Puerta, Dani Jarque and Marc Vivien-Foe, who, despite being all in peak physical condition, have all passed away either during a game or, in the case of Jarque, a training session.
Plenty of fodder for pensive self-reflection: should we, the fan, feel responsible for potentially asking too much of these young men? After all, they are only responding to our thirst and desire for constant perfection, searching for the performances to satiate our insatiable appetite. In this technological day and age, where money talks and the consumer is always right, these young men bore the brunt of perpetual demand.
A great, philosophical article in the making, surely. But, alas, it never materialised; thinking that the modern day football fan would not be interested in that introspective critique, that assertion that they could be culpable for sharing the blame, I deemed it too speculative and renegade.
But that was before the events of the weekend or, more specifically, Sunday morning. As many people were enjoying the remnants of their weekend, enjoying the downtime before another week of work, a family in Huntington, Cheshire, were coming to terms with being deprived of a father and a husband. And the world of football was rocked by an unexpected cataclysmic bolt-from-the-blue. Gary Speed was found dead at his home on Sunday morning, less than 24 hours after appearing on national television, a guest on Saturday’s Football Focus. In the hours since Cheshire police confirmed his identity and released a statement, tributes, eulogies and proclamations of praise have been as widespread and rife in a fashion as relentless and quick as Gary Speed was himself when an industrious player.
Players, coaches and fans, regardless of club loyalties, were all united in their grief and shock at losing one of the game’s greats, one of the game’s good guys, one of the game’s consummate professionals. A title-winner with Leeds – the last league title before it became ‘The Premiership’, nonetheless – the first player to reach the milestone of 500 Premier League games, the most-capped Welsh outfield player, the first manager of Wales who was daring to dream; it is undeniable that Speed left the same kind of mark on the game, the same lasting impression, that he did to all those who were lucky enough to meet him and came away with the knowledge that they had just been in the company of a true great.
Now is not a time to speculate on why a man as talented, good-looking and ambitious as Gary Speed found himself in a place as dark and ominous as he did; in all honesty, there will never be a time for that. What is true though is that he leaves behind a legacy that will be of more worth than St George’s Park, the F.A’s latest multi-million pound attempt at kidding themselves they have a grasp on nurturing youth. There are reasons why Gary Speed could still deliver those dogged, consistent, resolute performances, for five clubs, up until he was 40 and that is because he valued his body, he valued his teammates and he valued the professionalism which epitomised him and his work ethic. That, in itself, is more of an example to youth players than any amount of bio-science-data-tracking-metaphysical hair-brained scheme.
So when Bill Shankly decreed, in 1981, that football is more important than life and death, he did have a point that we take football very seriously. But the beautiful game pales in to obscurity when beautiful bastions of the game like Gary Speed are tragically seized from the world.
Introducing the neat little app that’ll pay you to view content tailored to your interests:
ThisisFutbol.com are seeking new writers to join the team! If you’re passionate about football, drop us a line at “thisisfutbol.com@snack-media.com” to learn more.