Date: Sun, 19 Jul 2020 20:14:05 +0000
From: writer guy <premiershiplads@outlook.com>
Subject: Premiership Lads part 150: Papi

Part 150: Papi


The coach ground through slow traffic on the outskirts of London. Pep
Guardiola looked out at the suburban sprawl and the rising view of the
city that was melting into position ahead of them. He hadn't actually
slept on the midday trip south from Manchester, but he seemed to have
drifted vaguely between consciousness and something like a daydream, his
tall body fully relaxed against the comfortable front seats of the
vehicle; the pleasant chatter and occasional louder bursts of noise from
the squad members behind forming a drowsy buzz.

On his lap were two notebooks, a laptop and a tablet, the vestiges of a
plan to go over his notes and plans again on the trip, to discuss them in
heated whispers with the rest of his coaching team, seated at various
intervals down the long vehicle, spaced out to create an atmosphere of
calm amongst the hyped up men as they moved south to the Semi-Final clash
with Arsenal.

It was at least partly still the buzz of UEFA lifting their attempted ban
and resolving matters with Kyle Walker, but the Spanish football manager
had not felt this calm and confident on the way to a match since a couple
of seasons ago, if ever at Manchester City. Of all the jobs he had taken,
the pressure at City seemed the greatest, perhaps because of the money
that oozed through the club and paid for no excuses. Pep's men had
already claimed one trophy this year, but they had been a distant 2nd
place to Liverpool's ascendency since before Christmas; the FA Cup and
Champions League seemed to be held up as non-negotiable outcomes by the
board above him, even if the contracts on his bonuses only stipulated
semis.

This was often the way for Guardiola, in reality: worry and overthink in
advance so that you can be relatively relaxed and confident on the day.
But today was extreme. He felt almost drugged. He let out a sighing
half-yawn and pushed the untouched notebooks and tech aside onto the
spare chair beside him, no intention of looking at them in the final slow
half hour of travel through the city itself. Instead, the 49-year-old
Spaniard leaned gently across in his seat and took a glance down the
coach, smiling proudly as he surveyed the distanced rows of his primed
players.

Inevitably, his eyes found his `Filipe'; Foden was halfway down the
coach, seated in a double to himself, grey-clad legs pulled up on the
seat and hugged to his wiry body, head tilted as he stared out at the
view, his thoughts unreadable on the tight sharp-featured frown of his
young face. Such a slight and gentle looking boy, from a distance, for
anyone who hadn't seen him get stuck in during a tense second half in
the Premiership; it was the iceberg quality of Foden that had made him so
striking to Guardiola in the first place, the hidden depths behind the
lithe Stockport scally and his tramlined eyebrows and short scruffy hair.

In the quiet of the coach, Pep allowed him a few long moments of staring
at the boy, as he never would in a more public and active instance. He
knew that the youth must feel ignored or neglected, knew that he risked
going too far the other way -- it was clearly as dangerous for staff or
players to feel he oddly ignored the gifted young Englishman as it was
for them to note and discuss his favouritism. After all, that favouritism
had been discussed and joked about long before he realised how true it
actually was, hadn't it? Still. He had to be cautious. He did his best
to address Foden rarely in group scenarios or in front of others,
limiting their player-coach interactions and holding carefully back on
giving him more match-starts than he was actually ready for.

Guardiola turned away slowly, comfortable in the plausible deniability
that he could have been looking at and smiling towards any of them. Some
part of him wished Phil had looked up and noticed the fondness in his
wrinkling eyes, but that was the kind of thought that endangered them.
Walker already knew something of what was going on, and Pep now assumed
that must mean Stones too had an awareness; that was already two more
noses than the head coach wanted in his most intimate business. Intimate
business. He could not hold in the grin that cracked his tanned features
as he stared back out of the window and thought about tonight. Once
Arsenal were trounced and their place in the cup final was secure, he
could let loose and truly enjoy himself.

In this jubilant pre-match mood, Pep could not help but let his mind
wander, as it had done all the way down the west of the country. Pressure
and anticipation made him reflective and dreamy. His excitement for the
evening match took him back to the first of his management career, only a
couple of years after retiring from Catalonia FC, and the sheer pleasure
he'd felt in readying his side for their league debut, a whole new
thrill after a long playing career in defensive midfield...



It hadn't even been the club's main squad, it had been their reserves,
their `Team B', that he was initially appointed to take over; a
long-time player there for the first half of his senior career, and now
at last part of their coaching hierarchy. Guardiola had been unable to
stop grinning and singing to himself for weeks after putting his name on
the dotted line in the contract, and he had entered his first day of work
there flying high on this invincible mood, just like today!

It hadn't mattered to 2007 Pep that it was the club's second team --
for now -- and that he was starting afresh in a very different to career
to his playing years. He was barely past his mid-30s, young and vibrant
and ready to learn. He knew that it would take two or three seasons
maximum managing `Team B' or similar before he was helming the full
senior squad in leagues and tournaments, here or elsewhere. Ideally here,
and in fact, it was only a year later that he was made manager of the
Spanish club's prime team.

On that first day, which he remembered vividly thirteen years on, he had
strolled into the club's training grounds feeling like a king returning
from exile, back in the club that had already given him so much as a
younger man! And in that elated mood, walking on air and slapping hands
with every man and woman he passed, he'd caught his first sight of him.

It had been on his way between the blocky buildings of the training
campus, preparing to address Team B in full in a meeting hall and outline
his priorities for the pre-season period; he had been much more formal
then, suited and booted and desperate to the look part. No grey skinny
jeans and slack black t-shirts, none of the self-assertion in his special
way of doing things, just a dark-haired man strolling across the grounds,
rehearsing a multilingual speech in his head, preparing to make an impact
on the Spanish team's reserves. And their paths had crossed, eyes
meeting between two intersecting paths: the other man had been jogging
by, running late for some training session, his long dark mane bouncing
with his gait, turning his rounded little face over and smiling a welcome
and vague recognition at the club's new junior manager.

Pep had waved his free hand at the passing young footballer, barely 21
then, and they had shared a quiet smile in the sunshine, and gone on with
their days, no idea how deeply their paths would interconnect over the
following years...



It was dangerous, he knew, but it had to be done; it was both
practicality and thrill. He had kept the two items in the pockets of his
thin gilet top, and he held his hands there, reassured by their shrunken
presence through the layered material until the moment came.

He and all of the team entourage were making their way through the quiet
passages of the Emirates stadium, and he had slowed his gait so that he
was falling a little behind, just a gentle trot of his long legs as he
followed the group down another flight of stairs and into the broad white
tunnel where the changing rooms lay. Just ahead of him, as he hoped, was
Foden; did the young lad slow down and break apart from the groups in the
hope of walking near or with him too, or was he just slow and
lackadaisical, or a bit alienated from the older lads that made up much
of the squad...? If it was the latter, Pep needed to feel some guilty
responsibility there.

No matter. He took a quick stride forward and hooked his fingers gently
at the crook of Phil's arm, feeling his wiry muscle through the thick
grey sleeve of his hoody, jolting him a little with the unexpected touch.
`Hey,' he murmured, slowing Phil down next to himself, tailing behind
the others, and dipping his free hand into the pocket of his gilet. He
clenched a fist about it and then held it towards Phil, who grasped it
off him, and widened his eyes at the feel of it. Pep took the small
canister of lube from the other pocket and pushed it into Phil's pocket
himself, enjoying the brief invasive feel of his hand slipping into those
joggers and grazing a bit of leg. `Put it in Filipe,' he said in a
husky voice, `and then you will be ready when I need you.'

Foden stuffed the butt-plug into his other pocket himself and stared
wide-eyed at his manager and lover, and Pep creased in a warm grin of
friendship, then patted the back of his head, the simple gesture of a
tactile and affectionate Spanish man. `We will celebrate in style,' he
whispered, and urged Phil to hurry on ahead, the other players
disappearing around an arched entranceway and into the Away rooms of the
stadium to ready themselves.



Another memory. 2008. Still in the black suits, still a dusting of dark
hair on his domed head; no dramatic tanned baldness and silvery beard
yet! He pictured himself stood on the sidelines, already managing the
first time, the youngest man ever to do so in La Liga. Blazer off,
tugging uncomfortably at his tie as he watched the game unfold, only the
second or the third of the season. Who had they been playing? He
couldn't actually remember now. Perhaps it was one of the Madrids. It
had been a big enough game anyway, he could remember the sense of
occasion as he pictured himself darting up and down the touchline, waving
and shouting at his men. His men! Back then, he was still getting used to
the notion of leadership and power.

And of the pitch he'd come, his special boy, his favourite player. When
had he become his favourite? Weeks, maybe months before that point,
already. Some slight injury, Guardiola couldn't quite remember what. He
just remembered standing on the edge of the pitch, watching him with a
note of concern more friendly than professional, watching his bouncing
run away from the action, slowing to a limp once the eyes of the crowd
were off him, so sublimely professional and determined. Pep had reached
for him, not just the casual slap of his shoulder, but taking his hand in
his, squeezing his sweaty palm and looking intensely at him for a moment,
needing to check he was really okay after all, just a twist of the ankle
or knee, nothing major...

And there on the edge of the game, whoever it was against, they'd shared
a moment, eyes meeting and fingers locking, and it had been like the
massive Spanish football match around them just vanished for a minute. It
was over in a millisecond, Pep's duty and responsibility crashing
through his dazed moment. He squeezed the 22-year-old footballer's hand
and then patted him on the back and nodded behind him, instructing him to
rest and get the attention he needed; he'd already scored a hat-trick
before receiving the injury, the match was as good as won. Back then,
with this boy on his squad, they always were.



Now, he stood on the edge of the Arsenal pitch, lifting his splayed hand
to his silvery chin, letting the little failures that allowed Arsenal's
goal to tick through his surprised brain. He stared hard into the
disappointed silhouettes of his players on the pitch and across at the
quietly celebrating Arsenal players, and then over at their delighted and
grinning manager. Mikel Arteta, he thought, one of the best assistants he
had ever worked with. He contemplated his recent protegee with a mix of
annoyance and admiration but decided against any distracting interaction
with him. He swung his eyes back to the nearer members of his squad. He
clapped his hands together and barked out some encouragement to them,
gesturing wildly to the nearest few about how to get a speedy
counterattack moving as soon as possible.

His cool confidence in tonight's outcome wobbled at his focused core,
and he folded his strong arms against the chest of his tight black
tshirt, trying to take a philosophical view and assume the best. Training
sessions this week had been consistently exercise, and he had his worries
about a few individuals and their focus, but the team had been performing
at top standard just yesterday afternoon. He hugged his arms to him
tightly and huffed out his breath into the sultry evening air, striding a
few paces down the touchline, watching as his midfielders lost the ball
again and Arsenal came dangerously close to yet another goal.



Another memory, as vivid as if it were five minutes ago, not twelve
years! If it wasn't so painful to do so, Guardiola would dredge it up
every night and treasure it, hold its sights and sounds and smells to him
as a vision of when he was happiest.

A room somewhere in the club's hidden corners. A boot cupboard, yes,
long shelves of them lined up and shining, ready for the next big match.
The setting hadn't mattered, simply that the two of them, the manager
and the footballer, were alone at last, hands on each other's bodies. He
had dragged his hands under the younger man's Barcelona shirt, feeling
his taut muscle, and stroked at the now shorter dark brown tresses of his
hair, pulling their faces close, letting his stubble tickle the smooth
young man's face as they shared their first kiss. So much more had
happened in that room than a kiss, that fateful day in 2009, later in
that first season of managing the club's `Team A', but it was the kiss
he remembered now, just the kiss...

The season had been drawing to a close and Barcelona, under Pep's
stewardship, were heading for the Italian treble for the first time in
their history. Guardiola was being lauded as the most talented manager in
the country, if not Europe, and not yet even 40 years old. And yet none
of that had seemed to matter, next to that kiss!



In his half-time team talk, Guardiola did not vent or rail against the
lads, he spoke quietly and encouragingly and assured them that the win
was still most definitely theirs. A change in mood or tactic now would
just be unsettling and disastrous. He maintained a mask of easy
determination as he returned into the warm twilight of the stadium and
watched things kick off once more. He risked another look over at Mikel,
seeing how much the Arsenal man was enjoying this, but how tense he still
was at his slim lead.

Pep paced and paced and then alternated with sitting awkwardly against
the cooler box of the players' drinks for the next break. He swung his
arms and then grabbed them to his chest and then bit his nails, something
he had not done in years, a revenant habit from the less experienced
stress of his early management days. It was time to start making
substitutions.

He took off Riyad Mahrez, unimpressed with the man's sloppy endeavours,
and clicked fingers at Phil Foden on the nearest substitute seat,
readying him to go on. He held his arms against his chest and did not
give a single look at the young player as he whipped off his tracksuit
down to his proper kit beside him; he could feel his cool and calm
cracking and sliding and he hated the thought of turning to Foden now and
revealing any of that on his tense face. He gave the most dismissive of
pats to the lad's shoulder before urging him ahead onto the field, then
turning his scowling and disappointed face on Mahrez instead. `We will
discuss that performance later,' he barked coldly at the midfielder,
then looked out on the pitch, seeing the slightly awkward way Foden was
running out to join the others.

It took Guardiola a moment of complacent confusion to twig why his star
substitute was jogging around so oddly and uncomfortably as he joined the
mix of players, all of whom wore their worry on their faces, not used to
losing when it truly mattered. He kept his eyes fixed solidly on Foden
for a minute, a rush of self-loathing rising up as he realised how
distressed and uncomfortable his boy actually was. It wasn't so much
that Pep had stupidly ignored what it might be like for his favourite to
wear the plug, but he had saw himself bringing Foden on in the final ten
minutes when City were 3-1 up at worst, not early on and when it really
mattered. It seemed he had also grossly overestimated Filipe's readiness
for inserting what he'd dismissed as a small and helpful toy, something
to prepare him more fully for their planned celebrations later tonight.

Pep brought both hands up to his face, grim and angry and regretful.
He'd just sent out a hobbled 20-year-old and wasted a substitution. He
needed to make more changes. Even dependable Kevin de Bruyne was sloppy
and distracted at the heart of the game; that redhaired fucker had lied
when he claimed to be `okay' in Pep's office, hadn't he?! Something
was decidedly wrong with the Belgian now! Why had he not picked up on
more in the final training session yesterday or on the coach here
today...?

Minutes later, Arsenal got their 2nd goal, and the game was all but lost.



2012, the day it all ended. These memories were less clear, and Guardiola
had little desire to fight age and forgetfulness and recall much more of
them. Still, even in the mists of the painful past, he could see himself
leaving the club owner's office in silent manly tears, his formal notice
handed in and his tenure at Barcelona over, still in his prime. If not
for certain other dramas, he might have stayed there for four more years,
won more leagues and trophies, but he ducked out after a perfect run of
years -- how many times had he had to stand in interviews or meetings or
casual conversations and repeat the lie? Ambition, variety, challenge,
the reasons he'd given for quitting Barca and moving to Germany for his
second management job, and later seeking out the Premiership to put even
more distance between himself and Spain.

Where had it all gone so wrong? He knew exactly where, but that
revelation and discovery was far too painful for him to address, even in
2020, standing in the midst of a very different disaster, watching his
team lose to Arsenal and crash out of the cup they thought was rightly
theirs. How could such a distant memory of a simple conversation sting
and burn so much in the present, with everything else he had done and
achieved since then...?

That day, the day he handed in his notice and left the director's office
with silent tears on his cheeks, he'd passed his boy in the exact same
spot as that first day in 2007, their paths intersecting in the lush
green grounds of Barcelona's high-tech training campus. This time, it
had been him hurrying, fists clenched and eyes misty with emotion, and
the 26-year-old football hero who moped slowly by, searching for his eyes
with a pleading frown of sadness. The international star had recently
become a father for the first time, and the new maturity showed in his
agonised face, but Pep had been unable to meet his gaze and really look
at him, rushing on, needing to be away. Something that he had been so
sure belonged entirely to him, given to another...



When the 2-0 loss was over, Pep made straight for Mikel, needing to
graciously concede to his former second-in-command. He grabbed the
slighter Spanish man's arm and nodded firmly, forcing the smile
befitting the other coach's achievement, and meeting his dark eyes. He
congratulated him in Spanish and, not for the first time, rued letting
him leave when he had, letting him break out and take his own full
management job so quickly. For his part, Arteta gave him a politely
controlled smile, no smugness or gloating in his stern expression and
posture. Pep let his hand linger at his arm, holding him for a second
longer, thinking back to the close dynamic they had briefly held as
manager and assistant, how fantastic it had been to have someone so in
sync with his own thoughts and strategies... ah well. It had been too good
to last, he thought bitterly, like so many things.



A more recent memory, 2016 -- or was it 2017? These things blurred a
little now, especially as he only thought about them when he was angry
and depressed.

A hotel room on an away trip like this, but somewhere abroad. Paris?
Rome? Milan? Hard to say. The night of a Champions League win, early in
his City career, crucial and satisfying. Sounds of partying had bled into
the room through an open window, dull thuds of music and the deserved
jubilation of the Manchester players in the hotel courtyard below,
distant from the abortive events going in that sweaty room. Him, sat on
the basket chair in the window, cradling his head in his hands, his white
shirt fully open over his hairy chest and tummy, his dark suit trousers
open at the waist too, exposing a little of his silky boxer shorts.

`I'm sorry,' the other man in the room said quietly, in their shared
language. `I misunderstood.' Pep, faking greater drunkenness than he
felt, just shook his head in his hands and groaned unhelpfully at the
hushed apology. After a little while, the other man spoke again. `I
ought to go. I'm sorry, chief. I went too far. I shouldn't...'

`No,' Guardiola had grumbled, not looking at him over the humid room,
but waving an apologetic hand his way and twisting in his seat a little.
`It isn't you, you did nothing wrong, I just...' His cock sat limply in
his boxer shorts, a little wet with the other man's saliva, having sat
in his mouth two minutes ago, failing to react to his hungry touch.
`Please, Mikel, just...'

`I should go,' sighed Arteta from his seated position at the end of the
bed, still buttoning up his own shirt, hanging his head shamefully.
`Please, boss, do not tell anyone, I just...'

And there hadn't been much more to say after that, just Arteta silently
exiting the room, and them both spending the next few years pretending it
had never happened, could never happened. Pep supposed that Mikel never
believed his reassurances, and always thought he'd misunderstood and
gone too far, tried to take advantage or whatever, abused their intimacy
as chief and deputy. But how could Pep ever have opened his mouth that
night and explained the truth? That it was no guilt over his own wife
that held him back, and made him push Arteta away from his crotch, but
his love for a young Argentinian that had burned in him for nearly a
decade at that point...?

Even then, in his early years of English football, almost seduced by his
assistant manager and fully seduced by the bright lights and big money of
the Premier League, he'd sat in his hotel room alone and cried dismal
tears, regretting the biggest mistake of his life: leaving Barcelona,
leaving HIM.



Bac in July 2020, Guardiola exploded into the hotel room, key grasped so
tightly in his right hand that it cut into his palm a little, the door
swinging loudly back on its hinges but not fully closing.

He knew it was deeply inappropriate to escape the stadium so rapidly and
selfishly, but his mind had felt close to exploding as their FA cup fate
was sealed. The thought of speaking to the players, inflicting his own
stupid anger and disappointment on them, or being caught out by BT Sport
interviewers, or having to discuss any of it with Arteta and his lot,
well... So he'd fucked off as quickly as he could, grabbing his jacket
and his briefcase and quitting the eerily quiet football stadium on his
own without even speaking to his second-in-command.

The walk from the Emirates stadium to the hotel was not even long enough
to cool him down or to clear his head. He had marched furiously up the
three short streets and almost lost his temper as he spoke in broken
sentences to the ladies on reception, demanding to check out early and
not even use tonight's decadent stay in their honeymoon suite. `But
what about your wife, where is she?' one member of the hotel staff had
asked in what she probably thought was a very pleasant way. `Perhaps we
can upgrade you even further and make your weekend better!' another had
suggested. Eventually, Guardiola had tore away from them and shot up via
the elevator, here now to grab together his things and get the hell out
of this stupid London hotel.

In the light of the lost semi-final and his own stupid mistakes, the huge
penthouse suite and its London views seemed ridiculous and embarrassing,
just a sprawling gallery of his hubris and disappointment. Staff had been
in here since he dumped his bags and bathed in the late afternoon, still
doped up with over-confidence in lazy complacency in their `safe' win.
He scowled about the spacious suite of rooms, looking at the copper
freestanding bath in the glass-walled bathroom where he had lounged
decadently and even drunk a late afternoon Scotch on his own before
dressing and heading back to the stadium to oversee the warm-ups. He
frowned unhappily at the gaudy pink-red rose petals that covered the huge
dark-sheeted bed in the centre of the main room, the ice buckets of
champagne placed on a long steel table at the foot of the bed. Somewhere,
he noticed, a scented candle had been lit in anticipation of a happy
couple. No doubt, he thought angrily, some sly fucker had noticed and
begun questioning where his wife even was. If word got to his coaching
team or players that he had splashed money on this special accommodation
and that his wife was back in Manchester, or worse, if word somehow got
to her about it, then...

He was spinning out of control. Months of pressure and years of secret
heartache were pressing in on him. He gave up on the easy task of
collecting his limited possessions and just stood in the centre of the
penthouse suite, knowing he needed to hurry up and get down to reception
so he could carry on demanding his partial refund and arrange some
transport to Euston and catch a train home. Home! To his wife! He thought
angrily about his own stupid obsessions, the way he'd let his fixation
on Filipe Foden dominate even in the build-up to this crucial game. All
of this! All of this fuss and romance... he stared around him furiously,
unable to believe his arrogance and naivety.

Pep was so fixated on his crashing mood that he didn't hear the noise of
the door or the awkward steps scratching at the laminate wood flooring,
not until the intruder was stood a couple of metres away from him,
panting loudly from rushing, and looking him up and down. He froze and
jerked his head that way, and stared awkwardly at him.

`Filipe,' he breathed cautiously.

`You left,' Foden gasped, standing there red-faced in tracksuit,
clearly fresh from the post-match hustle and bustle, blotchy-faced and
uncomfortable; still in his boots, which had scratched at the flooring as
he stormed into the room. He was shaky on his feet, breathless and
panicked-looking. Pep just stared at him in dim surprise, unable to
compute that he'd followed him from the stadium and made it up here
after him even as he plotted his embarrassing escape.

Guardiola stared at him and did his best at sounding detached and
uninterested. `I have been a fool, Foden,' he said quite formally,
holding himself still, bunching his hands into fists at his side. `I
have made poor decisions. I was arrogant and conceited. Tonight, we...'

`We're out of the FA Cup,' Phil panted at him. `So what?'

Pep creased his brows and stared hard at the naïve young man. `So what?
We are beaten by Arsenal tonight and you stand there and ask me so
what?' He made a loud tutting noise. `I knew you could never understand
my position at City, boy. Never.' He heard his own voice, cruel and
unfair, and hated himself, but he seemed to be on a spiral of anxiety
now, crashing since midway through the match and the twist in his
initially nostalgic remembrances.

Phil, taking one step closer, seemed to ignore his coldly dismissive
gambit. `And what about us?' he demanded, loud and quite shrill. `What
about me? You just fuckin' storm out of the footy stadium like I don't
even exist, cos we lost?' He threw his hands up questioningly, and moved
past Pep, circling him, stompy and uncomfortable.

`You are being ridiculous,' Pep gasped, but he may as well have said
the same about himself.

`I thought tonight was our night!'

`It should have been,' he shouted at him. `It was going to be so
special. I was a fucking idiot though, Filipe, and...' He let out a
growling cry of distress and waved on hand angrily at the innocent
youngster. `I am sorry, Foden, but...'

`You're sorry?' Phil shouted at him with a force and passion he'd
never once seen in the mild-mannered prodigy. Foden was storming right to
him now in the centre of the suite, squaring diminutively up to him and
gritting his teeth angrily. `What are you sorry for, Pep? For leading me
on? For making an idiot of me? For fucking with my head month after
month?' There tears sparkling in his vivid eyes. `For keeping me
waiting, for teasing and taunting me even when I do every fucking thing
you say?' He smacked both hands against the chest of Pep's black
tshirt, ineffectual in his shaky temper, but rocking with sudden rage.
`For making me run around in a shitty football game with a bit of rubber
up my arsehole and then running off and leaving me with everyone else
like I'm nothing to you? Which bit, Pep? Which bit are you sorry for?'
The tears burst lose and his questioning monologue turned into a
strangled sob. `Fuck you, Guardiola! FUCK YOU.'

Guardiola stood his ground, reaching to grab for Phil's shaking arms but
finding them scrabbling away from him, the young footballer backing off
from him, further into the big central bedroom of the extensive suit, his
boots clicking loudly on the floor and his tracksuit bedraggled around
his wiry frame. Pep took a slow step after him, speechless for a moment,
staring with dismal apology at him, trying to understand his own poor
decision-making, his own selfish rush. `I am sorry,' he said again,
hoarse and ashamed. He was nearing 50 and he felt like a foolish
teenager. He stared at the boy's heartbroken face and the ridiculously
luxurious room around them. Beyond Foden was the table of champagne and
treats and the petal-scattered bed. Ridiculous!

`I cannot explain it,' he started again, his voice weakened and gruff.
`I have let things become...'

`Are you saying it's over?' Foden asked boldly.

`Over? It's... I don't know, I...' He struggled for the words in
English, tried to step closer to the young man, annoyed as Phil backed
away from him instead, their paces crossing the room towards the table
and bed. `Calm down, Filipe,' he pleaded, `you are being dramatic,
and...`

`You're the man who fled his own football match!' countered Foden
angrily and righteously. Guardiola stared miserably at him and caught the
madness in their shouting match and their predicament, so that he almost
burst out laughing. He felt completed drained and maddened. He was angry
at his own petulant exit from the stadium, his reckless scape, his
selfish hiding up here, his plan to sneak onto a night train and vanish
north back to Manchester. How had he just abandoned a team like that
after a loss? He had NEVER done anything so rash or idiotic, but then...
he looked again at the extortionate hotel space around them, the luxury
he'd thrown money at to try to spoil and impress this very young man,
who was crying angry tears in front of him and backing away from his
reaching hands. Pep realised what a complete dick his desires had made of
him, for the second major time in his career, and he dropped his hands to
his thighs and stood there, gloomily defeated.

He tried to pick himself together, the tall suave football guru, not the
scatty sexually confused youth!

Foden was backing away from him more but snatching one of the heavy
champagne bottles up from its buckets in a rush of ice and water spilling
on the marl grey of his hoody and joggers over his footy kit. For a
horrible second, it looked like Phil was going to do something mad; swing
it at him in violent retribution or smash it crazily to the metal table,
but he was wrenching at the cork on it instead, a jumped-up little F1
winner on the podium for a minute. Pop went the cork, smashing away to
the side of them, and the geyser of top-price fizzy wine gushed out. Pep
stood there uselessly in his tshirt and jeans and watched Phil pull the
bottle over his head and let the contents gush out, white fizz frothing
over his sweaty dark hair and down the angular features of his face,
pouring over him, soaking his hood and collar and running down his
clothes. The pair of them stood in this mad tableau until every
overpriced drop of champagne was sticky on the lad's skin, soaking at
his clothes, trickling to the boot-marked floor around his feet.

Pep moved quickly forward and this time his Filipe did not pull away. He
grasped both hands to his neck, either side, and dragged their faces
together, kissing champagne from his lips. Phil's hands were immediately
and almost aggressively on the black cotton of his tshirt. Pep dragged
their lips together and bit gently at Phil's bottom lip, then shoved his
tongue in and snogged him properly, both of them groaning a little into
one another's mouths. The kiss became more aggressive, Pep's hunger
waking up and bursting past his anguish and self-pity. He tugged
viciously at Phil's hoody, failing to tear open its zip, scrabbling at
it with hurried hands and eventually tossing its sodden weight away from
his body, which shivered sweatily in his City shirt, sticky with fizz.
Phil was pushing up at his tshirt too and together, they eased each other
out of their tops. Shirtless and kissing, Pep pushed back, reached past
Foden, and grasped the other stupidly expensive bottle, zero interest in
drinking it. He lifted it to his mouth and, much more smoothly and easily
than Phil's little wrestle, took the cork in his teeth and twisted it
out. This time the geyser of alcohol spilled on them both, covering both
of their chests, splashing between them. They instantly kissed at each
other's bodies as Pep drizzled it decadently over them, pouring it in
Phil's hair and down on his own hairy chest and then into his own mouth;
Phil struggled to lick and kiss it out of his chest hair and off his
nipples and then in both of their mouths at the same time, hands grasping
painfully at bare contrasting skin, tanned and pale.

The glass bottles thumped to the floor without breaking and the two men
exploded into movement in their wrestling hug, Pep taking fuller control
of the slighter young footballer and dragging him to the bed, almost
throwing him to it so that rose petals cascaded from the sheets around
them. He threw himself down on top of him and kissed at his neck, which
tasted like champagne and sweat, and pinned him below his height and
weight, kissing every inch of his face and neck and shoulders and chest,
quickly rock-hard inside his jeans. `My boy,' he moaned, `my precious
boy...'

`Oh papi,' Foden responded, `oh yes...'

Pep pushed forward and dragged him further onto the bed, which felt even
more huge now they were on it. He held one of Foden's hands in each of
his and stretched them out and away, pinned down on the dark sheets, arms
over arms, chest over chest, face over face. Crotch over crotch! Their
sticky champagne kiss ground on and their bodies writhed together, all
loud breathy moans. Eventually, anger and self-loathing broke through
Guardiola's lust and he lifted himself up a bit to try and apologise
more, muttering half-sentences and empty explanations, but Phil quickly
told him to shut up. `Papi, just fuck me,' he begged, `just make me
yours, PLEASE... you PROMISED...'

`Yes,' the 49-year-old moaned, `yes I did, my Filipe...'

He sat back, held tightly onto Phil's body, and flipped him onto his
front, hands dragging stickily over his blotchy skin. He massaged his
hands down the legs of his jogging bottoms and wrenched his boots off one
at a time, not bothering to undo the laces, then pulling on the socks and
tickling briefly at the soles of his feet. Then the joggers, peeled down,
sodden wet with spilled fizz, exposing the crumpled footy shorts beneath,
stuck to his smooth skin around his thighs and buttocks. `Oh sir,'
Filipe whined for him, `oh, papi...!'

Pep dragged down the shorts and then the Under-Armour shorts below, and
parted those beautiful perky pink cheeks; between them he could see the
flash of blue plastic, the plug still loyally fixed in the virgin hole,
stretching and preparing it for him as demanded. He felt a dizzying surge
of love for the boy who had loyally followed his instructions, even at
the expense of his comfort and confidence on the pitch, and kept it in
right until now. He pushed two fingers in there and pulled on it, gentle
but commanding. Phil howled at the relief of its exit. Instantly,
Guardiola went down, pushing his tongue into the sweaty hole and tasting
Foden's effort on the pitch for him, doomed but full of optimism and
love. He lapped at the sweaty arse and squeezed and pinched his cheeks.

`Papi, yes,' Filipe shouted, `oh YES, fuck it feels so good...'

With more clumsy desperation than before, none of the masterly control of
his teasing sessions eating the lad's arse out, Pep licked and rimmed
him, pausing only to bite each buttock a little and slap at them with his
sticky palms. Unable to stop himself, he gave up on the dirty task and
kissed his way up Phil's lean smooth back instead, tracing his spine
with lips and tongue and snogging the back of his neck aggressively. `I
will never leave you anywhere again,' he promised rashly and loudly in
his hear. `You're my boy, I love you, you're the best... I want you so
much, my Filipe! Fuck the cup, fuck them all, I just want YOU...' He
growled with desire, cuddling and squeezing him from behind, rolling side
to side on the bed and spooning him in several positions.

He was different tonight, he knew, humbled and ragged with defeat; but
Phil was different too, assertive about what he wanted. He was wriggling
out of their long kissing positions, reaching for the front of Pep's
jeans, desperate to open them and get them off. Eventually, the football
manager relented, throwing his arms aside and lying on his back so that
his precious golden boy could wrench the denims open and peel them down
his thick furry legs, then kiss hungrily at the front of his heavy
trunks, tasting his cock through the material. Off came those trunks, and
the pair of them were fully naked now, all clothing kicked away and
petals fluttering off the bedding around them. But Pep gripped Phil's
wrists and held him down, silencing his hungry sluttish whines with a
kiss and resting controllingly on top of him, pausing the magic. `We
only do this if you are sure,' he intoned heavily. `I will not rush
you.'

`You can do anything to me,' was Foden's gasping answer, his voice
thick with his Stockport accent.

His submission stoked fires inside the Spaniard, but his affections were
as strong as his lust. `I know I can,' he chuckled hoarsely back,
`because you are all mine, all fucking mine. But I won't hurt you, I
won't rush you. Tell me you're ready. TELL ME YOU'RE READY.'

`I am so ready,' his Filipe almost screamed in his face. Just as Pep
made to let go of his wrists and throw him heavily on his front, the boy
grabbed at the coarse beard hair and his jawline and pulled close enough
for another kiss, and whispered at him. `The handcuffs?' he asked, a
naughty glint in his eyes. Pep almost screamed too now, so in love with
everything about this moment, football and his past completely forgotten.
In fact, it was like whole years and decades could disappear, just like
the FA Cup and Arteta's face and everything in Barcelona; he was just a
young man for a moment, just 20 like Filipe, young and so invincibly
virile. He was not a married 49-year-old with an entire football club to
worry about, just a horny young fucker in love.

Guardiola hopped momentarily from the bed and found the cuffs in the
depths of one bag, and with them a gag. He turned, stood tall by the bed
with his big Spanish cock hard between his legs and below the bush of his
pubes. Phil was on the bed on his back, gasping and moaning, stiff-dicked
and limbs stretched out, eyes fixed on his master. Pep smirked at him,
stopping only to relish the image and the delicious anticipation of what
they had both been building up to for so long. Before he took full
control, he clutched the props in each hand and bent over the side of the
bed, kneeling for a long moment to stoop down and kiss the tip of
Foden's cock, always so surprisingly girthy and solid for a petite and
skinny lad like him, if not comparable to his own huge wood. The young
City player gasped desperately at this brief blessing and begged his name
and titles. `Pep, papi, sir, mmm...'

Then he was cuffing his hands together and wrapping the gag about his
mouth, stretching his body out and pulling in beside him, fingering his
wet hole, delightfully loosened by the hours of plugging. He loved the
muffled cry of Foden's enjoyment and pain. As he fingered him, he kissed
at his neck and shoulders but held his head down into the pillows, almost
smothering him for a moment by accident, inserting a second and then
third fingers into his slick ring. And then he was ready to insert his
cock. No words, no dirty talk, no master/servant play, just raw
physicality. He hugged both arms about Phil's narrow muscular chest and
guided his dick between his cheeks, finding his twitching hole, edging
the tip of his meat into him. He thought he was listening to Phil's
delighted moaning, but remembered the tight gag, realised it was his own
-- boyish and lusty and full of unadulterated enjoyment. He forced inch
after inch into the lad, into his Filipe.



The floor of that boot-room in Barcelona in 2008 had been hard and cool
on their skin as they stripped, Pep shedding his suit and the boy
stripping his red and blue kit in hurried motions. Now Pep was kissing
not his gorgeous soft lips but his smooth chest and his tight pink
nipples and down his achingly muscular tummy to his naval. And then,
somehow, in a blur, they had shifted positions, the most promising young
footballer in Europe was facing away from him, and he was fingering down
the saggy white fabric of his ill-fitting briefs, pulling on them and
exposing inch after inch of bulbous pale muscle, getting access to his
gorgeously shaped rump.

`My boy,' he'd purred in the darkness of the boot-room.

`Oh papi,' groaned the greatest footballer in the world.



Phil's body bounced and shook beneath him like a ragdoll. Always he kept
hold of him, gripping him with one or both arms, keeping their tight hot
bodies together as they shifted positions on the bed, testing its
mattress and springs and dragging its neat sheets and duvets out of shape
until all of the bedding was rustling onto the floor and it was just
simple sheets creasing and tugging and loosening beneath the sweaty
machinations of their bodies.

Over and over, Guardiola ploughed him with the thick veiny shaft of his
Catalonian cock. He bit on the lobe of his ear and at the hewn outline of
his jaw. He gnawed at the flesh of his shoulder, leaving little
teeth-marks in his pink-white skin. He pinched and squeezed his dark
little nipples, grabbed at his thin six-pack and at his flailing arms, at
the clinking and rattling cuffs that held them together in front of them.
At some point, consumed with lust, he even tugged the gag away from his
face, needing to hear his screams and cries. Pep's own voice mingled
with this, shouting in English and Spanish and English again.

He didn't hold back, he couldn't. He fucked the youngster with all his
strength, in and out, in and out, long powerful strokes that made him
ache down there, never mind the virgin's hole. For a long time he
resisted the reach-around, but eventually gave in to it, unable to keep
his hand off Phil's delightfully fat hard-on, wanking him whilst
piledriving his rear. At that point, pleasured at all sides, Phil could
no longer form the words `Oh papi' and `YES SIR', his voice just
became a trailing squeal of base enjoyment. Pep screamed hungry
obscenities in his ears, no idea what he was saying, and fucked him hard
into the groaning sweaty mattress, discovering pools of youthful energy
he hadn't experienced since his 30s. He felt Phil, inevitably, shoot his
load, only minutes after touching his cock for the first time; the
internal stimulation was too much for him, how could he be expected to
edge and wait? He fucked on, wanking stream after stream of spunk from
the young lad, letting it smear over the sheets below while building
slowly up to his own.

He turned them on their sides and held Foden more tightly than ever, both
arms about his body, gripping him very tightly, driving his hips into his
backside in thunderous motions that made the whole bed rock, and then...
and then... and then... Oh yes. He spewed his creamy load inside his
precious young player and hugged him tight to him as he did it, growling
words in whatever language he fancied into his ear and then planting
sloppy wet kisses on the sweaty grease of his neck, their bodies rocking
with each of his deep breaths and moans. Their limbs and back/chest felt
stuck together with a mix of sweat and champagne. He left his cock inside
him, attached and interlocked, and hugged him against his hot chest and
stomach, tickling at him with the hairiness of his strong older body.

`How was it?' Guardiola dared to ask at long last, only then beginning
to pull back with his waist, loosing his throbbing cock from what he
assumed was the agony of the deflowered arse. He moved carefully now,
tender and slow in sharp contrast to the wild beastly motions of the past
hour of fucking, turning Phil onto his front to save him more pain, and
lying alongside him. He traced his fingers up and down his back, kissed
him on the crown, rubbed his sleepy body on his side and breathed down on
his face. `How was it?' he asked again, when it was just exhausted
moans emerging from Phil's lips.

`It was unbelievable,' Foden eventually replied, tilting his head so
their eyes could meet. He looked more young and innocent than ever,
impossibly, a little angel of an athlete in his manager's arms. Pep
laughed indulgently, delighted with this answer.

`It will get better every time,' he promised. `I know you must be in
so much pain, but it will get better. I will look after you. I will never
hurt you.' He kissed him in the centre of the forehead. `Was it really
good? How did it feel? Was it very different to anything else?' His
questions sounded as awkward and teenage as he felt when he was with his
golden boy, but he didn't care. He wasn't even 100% sure if he was
speaking in Phil's language or not, the way the lad stared uncertainly
at him. After repeating himself, definitely in English, and still facing
those wide mystified eyes, he felt a little lurch of worry, and squeezed
Foden close. `You are okay, aren't you? It's okay if it hurts, it's
hard not to, but if I went too hard, or too fast, then...'

`Of course it hurts,' tittered Filipe gently, `you're massive,
but...'

`What is it?' Kiss, kiss. `What is wrong? What can I do?'

`I just...' Phil's voice faded into a laugh and he wriggled in Pep's
strong hold, stroking his chest hair with fingertips and rubbing his leg
over Pep's thigh. `It felt amazing, sir, it felt so incredible, it
was... but...' The `but', in this intimate hold, was terrifying. Pep
stared down at him adoringly, wanting to somehow spring another boner and
smash his arse all over again right now, though neither of them would
really be up to it tonight! Maybe in the morning? The `but' hung there
in this magical contemplation and he stared searchingly at the
20-year-old footballer.

`When you came,' Phil said hesitantly.

`Si? Yes?'

`You...' The longest and most awkward two second pause ever.

`What? What is it?'

Phil took and released a deep breath, which tickled at his neck and chin,
then met his eyes with crazed boldness and curiosity, leaping past
indecision. `Who's Leo?' he asked in a barely audible whisper. `When
you came, you screamed for Leo... Pep, papi, who is Leo...?' The lad
stared at him with trusting eyes, blinking and pouting and straining. Pep
stared back in silent guilty horror.



Finished, the two men in the boot-room untangled their bodies, both
shaking a little at the shock of what they'd done. Guardiola lay on his
side, gently releasing the tight-packed muscular physique of his star
player, concerned he must have hurt him by sticking it in there, and with
no lubricant. He stared down into the small handsome face of the young
athlete and pulled some of his shaggy dark fringe out of his eyes.
`You're okay?' he asked him in Spanish. The young player nodded and
smiled, but weakly and nervously, clearly in pain.

Pep stroked his upper arm and his shoulder, and laughed anxiously, guilty
at the force with which his older and more experienced body had given in
to their shared lust. Desperate to somehow appease the moment, he reached
across the cold tiled floor for some of their discarded clothes, found
the boy's Barcelona shirt. He scrunched it up and brought it close,
sliding it beneath his head as a tiny and ineffective pillow to support
his face as they lay there staring in marvel and disbelief at their first
male sexual partner. Beneath the footballer's head, only a sliver of the
colourful Barcelona shirt still showed, but it amused Pep, since it was
the strip of its back that carried his name, displaying it in bold white
letters beside his gasping young face.

`What?' the Barcelona star asked him innocently.

`Nothing, my boy,' Guardiola told him gently, admiring his beauty and
running a thumb over one of his mostly smooth cheeks, tickling at the
faint gingery stubble that grew there, and looking past him to the folds
of his shirt, such a terrible cushion, but excellent name-badge, the
letters spelling it out even in the dim light of the boot-room:
`MESSI'.




**WELL, THAT'S DEFINITELY THE MOST DRAMATIC EPISODE YET... SORRY IF IT
GOT A BIT MUH! HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS MAD 150TH EPISODE OF THE SERIES, AND
THE FANTASY IS AS FUN AND ABSORBING AS EVER. THANK YOU FOR READING AND
ALWAYS LETTING ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK.**