For those contemplating fatherhood or motherhood, and who dream that your progeny will become a footballing genius, please note. Timing is everything.
Please let me explain. After the events of the weekend, I’ve become even more convinced that footballing genius is written in the stars.
I’m skeptical by nature, particularly when it comes to the pronouncements of soothsayers, clairvoyants, coffee cup and tea leaf readers and astrologists.
But I make an exception when it comes to predicting exceptional football talent. I’m convinced that extraordinary football talent isn’t determined so much by the culture you learnt to play the game in, or the age you began playing the game, or your genes, although these play a part. No dear reader. Exceptional football talent, (let’s call it genius), is a matter of what star sign you are born under.
Let’s do the research and survey the greats of past and present. We’ll start at the top. Maradona and Pele, often cited as the two greatest players of all time. Both born uncannily on the 30th October. These two Scorpions are joined by a third genius, a second Brazilian, the mercurial Garincha born on the 28th October. All three possessed footballing skills that made mere mortals gasp in amazement.
Let’s get a bit more modern. The man with the greatest name in the history of the game, the outstanding Zinedine Zidane, together with the wonderful Lionel Messi ( Five times winner of the Ballon D’Or), have birthdays which fall a day apart on the 23rd and 24th June, which makes them both Cancerians. Do you follow my drift? It’s the water signs. They’re the signs producing geniuses on the park.
If that’s not enough evidence, let’s switch codes. On Saturday, the Tigers brought joy to their legions of fans by winning their first premiership since 1980. Although the Tigers had many fine individual performances in the Grand Final against the Crows, one player stood out as he has all season. Sporting fearsome neck tattoos and Mohawk style haircut, Dustin Martin emerged with yet another couple of medals from the match, a premiership medal and the Norm Smith Medal, to add to his Brownlow, becoming the first player in the history of the game to do so, prompting AFL legend, Leigh Matthews to comment that Martin has had the greatest individual season in the history of the game.
Worshiped by Tiger fans, loved by his teammates, Martin has thrilled even the neutrals with his talent. Yes you guessed it, Martin a Cancerian born on the 28th June, is yet another football genius born under a water sign.
And at the risk of labouring the point, the legendary Lethal Leigh Matthews, officially recognized as the greatest AFL footballer of the 20th century, is a Piscean.
So there you have it. Dads, dreaming of fathering a genius, make a date for a romantic evening with the love of your life sometime at the beginning of June, or October or February. And that should set your child on the course to football immortality.