Benedict McCarthy’s life, like that of all world class footballers these days, is a fairy tale. Sadly, it’s turning in to one of those grim — Grimm — continental stories where the kids get their hands burned and the wolf has big teeth.
McCarthy isn’t complaining, of course. He’s a millionaire, women fall at his feet and he appears to have all kinds of football clubs willing to pay him thousands of pounds a week.
But at 27, with years of goal nabbing to come, he finds himself at a bit of a crossroads, with the emphasis on cross. If you ask me, his future lies in London, where reborn West Ham are apparently still keen on a slightly wayward talent that Alan Pardew may just be able to handle.
Sadly his current club, Porto, left him at home when they travelled to sunny Scotland and, surprisingly, lost to ailing Rangers in their opening Champions League game on Tuesday night.
With Rangers encountering surprising problems of their own in the Scottish Premier League — they’re barely mid-table for heaven’s sake, having lost to Hibs and drawn with Falkirk! — this was an ideal time for the Spanish-reared Capetonian to come up with a couple of goals for his Portuguese outfit and attract further interest from those high-paying British clubs.
But apparently the new Porto manager, Co Adriaanse (incredibly their fourth attempt at leadership since Jose Mourinho conquered Europe with the club in 2003), took exception to McCarthy turning up with a couple of attractive hairdressers at the team hotel last weekend.
Adriaanse, shocked by the 3-2 defeat against Rangers after opening his league campaign with three wins, is a bit of a disciplinarian. He fines players for wearing one earring. Trying it on with two hairdressers was always going to be a bit much. McCarthy claimed the attractive women were there to fashion his dreadlocks — which are also banned by Adriaanse.
”If you want to be a team, you need rules. Benni broke those rules,” Adriaanse said. McCarthy, their top scorer last season, stayed in Portugal and seethed beneath his dreadlocks.
McCarthy’s international stature is quite hairy too. After breaking on to the world stage with a brilliant performance at the African Cup of Nations six years ago, McCarthy has spent years popping in and out of the Bafana Bafana camp. He played in this month’s disastrous 3-1 defeat against Burkina Faso but insisted afterwards: ”I am not a spent force.”
He said: ”We are all gutted to miss out on the World Cup but I have no time for people who question my loyalty to South Africa. Or my passion or commitment.”
Hmm. Passion. Two hairdressers in the team hotel on a Friday night before the league game against Rio Ave sounds fairly passionate to me.
And so to Upton Park, still known as The Academy of English football, where the no-nonsense Pardew is re-creating the heady old days of Bobby Moore, Martin Peters and Geoff Hurst. McCarthy actually had a medical at West Ham before the season began but Porto suddenly broke off talks on a £6,3-million deal.
Now Teddy Sheringham is scoring at the ripe old age of 39, Belgian Jeremie Aliadiere has arrived on loan from Arsenal, former Brighton bomber Bobby Zamora is still about, Frenchman David Bellion is on loan from Manchester United and on Monday night Marlon Harewood restored his confidence with a hat-trick in a rousing 4-0 win over Aston Villa.
Harewood said of McCarthy’s possible arrival: ”It is not extra pressure for me, it’s just good competition. It brings out the best in everyone here because if you want to play you have to give everything.”
West Ham, despite denials, remain interested. Pardew flew to watch South Africa play Germany last week and returned, saying: ”It would be unfair to my strikers to say Benni is my number-one target — I have to make sure he’s better than the players I’ve got already. I have to find a player who would inspire people like Teddy, Marlon and Bobby.
”I thought by throwing Benni’s name in it would be a new challenge for my guys. Sometimes you feel a connection with a player. I think he wanted to come here and I wanted him. I’m over the disappointment now, but I still think we need another striker.
”By the next transfer window [in January], we should know. Hopefully the guys I’ve got will come through with flying colours. In fact, I hope I don’t have to bring Benni in.”
McCarthy’s South African agent Rob Moore, who has tried unsuccessfully to bring his star turn to the English Premiership ever since he was a bright young thing at Ajax Amsterdam and Celta Vigo (Aston Villa and Middlesbrough early on, and Everton just about had his name on the contract after they sold Wayne Rooney last year), is no doubt watching and waiting.
And hoping McCarthy cuts down on the hairdressers. Come January, when the transfer window reopens, six months in the Premiership might be just the short-cut Benni needs to revive his career.