It took me a few hours to click on Marcus Rashford's name. Only 8% of seven million Fantasy Premier League managers have him in their team. In the kind of goal-scoring form Rashford is in, any other forward would've had managers scrambling through their transfer options.
A primer on Fantasy Premier League: you are given 100 million in FPL currency to build a team of 15 players, out of which 11 can play. You are given one free transfer every week. If you are familiar with Dream11, this is similar but without the money and conflict of interest. There are points for every goal, assist, and clean-sheet. In this game of rationality, Rashford and his team-mates have not made a good impression this season.
I sacrificed a prized asset (James RodrÃguez) for Rashford precisely because of his low ownership. This decision could either catapult me to a meadow of green arrows or clog my WhatsApp inbox with memes and laughter-tears emojis.
There, I believe, lies a microcosm of Rashford as a footballer. Over the years, he has shown many glimpses of magical ability, but often, they have only been glimpses. He rarely goes on a run of consistent attacking output. In a team of middling ability, his lack of ruthlessness often holds back more than what his talent can propel.
But something has changed about Marcus Rashford this summer. Or maybe, something has changed in me when I look at him. I cannot speak, write, or think about him without gushing over what he has achieved outside the football pitch. At a time of unprecedented duress, Rashford left the safety and comfort of his centrally-heated home in Cheshire to weave a protective blanket for vulnerable children across England.
Throughout the summer, between bus-rides to and from football games, Rashford bulldozed the conservative UK government into adopting more inclusive and long-lasting food policies. He broadcasted food supply messages on Twitter the morning after scoring a winner against Paris Saint-Germain. It may never be known, but the MBE Rashford was awarded could have been a calculated ambush to control his passion. His efforts doubled. When various government cronies hardballed, he nutmegged them all as if they were Martin Demichelis at The Etihad.
It boggles my mind every day that Rashford is doing this at an age when I rarely thought beyond shawarma. He need not have. Elite sport affords you the privilege of apathy. He could have quote-tweeted some activist’s message on a break from discussing his ratings on the latest video game. Or he could have just lived life from one game to another - you know, sticking to football. He was entitled to his choices, which is all the more reason why his summer deserves to be draped in eternal sunshine.
Legacy is a funny thing that way. A couple of days back, Diego Maradona turned sixty. Articles and grainy videos poured in from all corners of the internet. Some fans in Bangladesh, like those famous ones in Naples, built him a shrine. But everyone, even the ones lighting the candles on those shrines, quietly accepted the asterisk next to his career. Try as you may, you cannot speak about Diego without pausing to acknowledge Maradona.
Diego became a favourite because he took viewers out of their chairs and pulled their jaws into the ground from sixty yards away. In ninety minutes of football, he left memories for life. He spoke truth to power; he screamed for Argentina; he carried a forgotten club from a forgotten Italian city to domestic and continental triumph. Diego was an adrenaline shot that you were allowed to take every weekend.
The other side of the coin was darker and blemished. Maradona cheated the very sport he graced. He robbed his fans of the blanket of magic they had wrapped around themselves. In Naples, the same fans who built him a shrine wanted him gone before the next sunrise. Back in Buenos Aires, he overpriced the tickets for his farewell match and pocketed all the profits.
Diego Maradona left stains on his legacy that no amount of video reruns can rub clean.
Marcus Rashford turned twenty-three the day before Maradona turned sixty. He plays against Arsenal at Old Trafford tonight. With Anthony Martial missing, he might take up the centre-forward’s spot again. Rashford may not give me positive returns on FPL, or worse, get himself red-carded in the third minute. He may well follow it up with a stinker in his next game. But when I think about it, none of it really matters. Rashford could play out the rest of his career without another goal or assist, and it will still not change his story.
Numbers cannot begin to explain people like Marcus Rashford and Megan Rapinoe. They don’t belong to drunken, loud conversations about great footballers where statistics are thrown around like poker cards; but to the softer musings, after the alcohol has sunk in, the lights are dim, and the music is mellow, about the kind of heroes you would want your kids to have.