George Best - Tribute to a Hero

George Best was not one of the greatest soccer players ever. He was the greatest. So much the best that God gave him that very name! He was the first hero I ever had. I put my obsession with having long hair down to him being the first person that I ever really looked to as a roll model. I remember the goal he scored against Benefica in the 1968 European Cup Final. I was six and I can remember most of the entire day. I can remember my Primary 2 teacher Mrs McCart telling me Colin Bell should have been player of the year instead of Best in 1968 and being mad. Ironically Bell became my hero when I switched sides of Manchester and started a loyal til-I-die and most of the time a misery inducing devotion to City. I can remember that goal that never was when England’s Gordon Banks dropped the ball to kick it and Best, quicker than a flash, flicked it over his head, ran round him and headed it into the net. No studs were showing, there was no danger to Banks and a moment of wonder that would have meant the world to Northern Ireland fans packed into Windsor Park. I remember when he retired. It was sad and disappointing that I would miss five years of such brilliance.

I grew to hate all things United accept for George Best. He was from Northern Ireland and was ours and was without doubt the most exciting footballer ever. Some say Maradonna but he had only one foot. Some say Cruyff but he hadn’t the all round game. Some say Pele and he might be the one with a real challenge but he said Best was the best and George and I have always settled for that judgement. I got angry one time when Jimmy Greaves rated Kevin Keegan above Best. Come on, I know he’d later manage City, but they are not even in the same stratosphere. If Best had been English he would have been a Sir and statues would be erected all over England. You can keep your Bobby Moores or Paul Gascoignes or Wayne Rooneys. They couldn’t tie his boot laces!

It was the flair, the ability to be standing in midfield and then to take off with acceleration and balance, leaving the opposition in his wake and then hammer the ball past a hapless goalkeeper. It was that goal against Tottenham where from a corner kick he stood still on the edge of the box, as the crowded goal mouth panicked, and arms by his side, like an Irish dancer, delicately lobbed the ball over everyone including the best goalkeeper in the world, his mate from Northern Ireland Pat Jennings. It was the vision in his passing, the power in both feet, the leap for the cultured header, the ability to fight back and tackle like a left back, the speed of mind and foot and the ability to shimmy and entertain and do it all with a pop star hair cut and charisma.

He changed football forever and my love of the game is all about him. My frustration with the modern footballer is that none can compare. Yes, Giggs can weave past defenders with similar sway and Henry can caress a football into the net from anywhere with a magician’s deftness. Yes Rooney’s speed of thought can do some unpredictable things that are breath taking and Ronaldo can dance and juggle. But George Best was like them all rolled into one. He had everything. He was a live entertainer, with an imagination.

And I guess he threw everything away. He was short of his sixtieth birthday when he died; a young man. He had limped from crisis to crisis in health and relationship break up and bankruptcy for thirty years. Everything was related to his alcohol abuse, the disease that killed his mother before him. It would be easy to point fingers. It would be easy to have no sympathy like those who questioned Best getting a new liver after he had senselessly pickled his own. It would be easy but who was there to see this east Belfast boy through the slalom of media spotlights and celebrity temptations that were hitherto unknown? Who was able to make his life as meaningful as those days when he lived out the full potential of his vocation to the echo of 60,000 appreciative fans? The sportsman has struggles to face that the rock stars or movie stars don’t. McCartney and Jagger and Dylan, his peers in the sixties, can still play to the crowd, still re-create the magic of the song whereas the blistering run through the defense is long gone for the aging footballer.

Best is an incarnate lesson to us all that giftedness, fame and money are not what ultimately makes us happy and indeed can be the seeds of our very destruction. In a world where the first are always first, he shows us that even getting to the top is no guarantee of peace of mind as remaining there proves impossible and the fall from the pinnacle can be miserable to live with. He shows us that you can use your brilliance to gain the world and in the process lose yourself.

George didn’t need judgement, he needed grace. Yes, when we gave him grace he abused it but Jesus said we shouldn’t offer it to him seven times but seventy times seven. He should not be remembered for the headline that saw him in police custody or for the various drunken escapades or the pictures of bad health but for the way he kicked a football. He was a genius and sadly there are many geniuses who cannot handle the gift they are given. It wasn’t his fault he was the best there ever was.

Being born in 1961 I was a child of the sixties but almost too young to really remember them. So I had three things I committed myself to seeing in my life; George Best, Bob Dylan and a Beatle. I am glad to say that I saw them all, though I’d have preferred it was Harrison to McCartney! Best wasn’t at his prime when I saw him play for my hometown club but I remember breathtaking passes and the thrill of every touch. I also got to shake his hand when I processed with him in a graduation ceremony at Queens University, Belfast when he received an honorary doctorate. I remember him walking into the room and being in awe. It was a joyous moment which brought back memories of childhood, my United shirt with the number 7 sticky-taped on the back. I loved that man. He was Northern Irish like me! He was the greatest and I got to see him. His death was a sad, near tragic, moment. I took it harder than I had thought I would. It was a sign of my love. Every tear was a tear of celebration for the things we can never see again.

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