Sorry, but I'm not going to say thanks to Goonersworld for this image.
When I first saw him, I thought he was a lookalike. I assumed that someone who looked very much like Bacary Sagna was having a drink in my local. It was a few minutes later, when I overheard someone talking excitedly on the phone, that I realised it really was Sagna. What on earth he was doing drinking in a none too salubrious (I don't mean to be insulting - it's OK, just not China White, if you know what I mean) pub on the Cally?
Within a very short time, I began to realise what it must be like to be a celebrity. Monsieur Sagna had not a moment's peace to finish his bottle of Coke, to continue his conversation (in French) with his mate, to watch Chelsea bang yet another one in, or to ignore the woman who sat next to him. He was almost continuously plagued by people asking for autographs or pictures with the (terrified) kids in Emirates shirts, and took it all in a fairly good-natured - if occasionally surly - way. I could see that he was a little annoyed at being interrupted while watching the first Anelka goal, and offered a very cursory handshake while looking at the TV screen, but every other incursion into his privacy was dealt with politely and patiently. He was offered some words of advice on football tactics by an elderly man with no teeth, wearing a baseball cap, and only solemnly blinked his rather unusual eyes in response.
Sagna is - though this is Gooner heartland, so perhaps not wholly representative - a relatively minor superstar, and yet he was not able to enjoy more than a minute or two's peace.
2 comments:
I once saw Andreas Andersson (who could loosely be described as a Newcastle United centre-forward) get pestered for an autograph by a man with needle tracks all the way up his excessively tattooed arms on Consett High Street. He looked about as comfortable as he did in front of goal.
That said, he did score against Man Utd once. At Old Trafford.
I'd be pissed off if I was a player too. But I'd just smile and think where my cash comes from.
Andreas Andersson. Now there's a name to conjure with.
I didn't see Sagna put his hand in his pocket now you come to mention it, not even for his own bottle of Coke.
I was talking to someone last night who had a theory that he was in the pub doing a dodgy deal which he didn't want the club to find out about...
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