THE FOOTBALL ANARCHISTS
- Federico Grassi
- 19 feb
- Tempo di lettura: 5 min
Aggiornamento: 4 apr
"Everything I know about morality I learned on the football field and in the theater – my true universities." — Albert Camus
I have a Neapolitan friend who's a genius. A total genius. We're in Rome, Monteverde, coffee in hand, the sun brushing the walls of the houses. As usual, I'm boring him with my ruminations: the hyper-specialization of the modern world, the way technology shapes every breath we take, the vitality slipping away from us like an oversized shirt, and so forth.
Bruno has dark curls, green almond-shaped eyes—designed, it seems, to inspire instant warmth—and broad shoulders that carry the weight of something he refuses to share with the world.
He listens or pretends to, letting my words barely graze him like a spring breeze. He humors me, always, settling comfortably into whatever I declare. Not out of politeness but for sport. To pass the time, to chase it without ever catching it, to indulge in fleeting passion, believing my ideas for a brief moment, claiming them as his own for a day or two more. Then, he forgets them, returning to the things that truly matter. Which ones? I've never figured it out. He laughs and fires off brilliant, definitive statements. Genius-level insights that even he doesn't take seriously. Bruno is, in short, a first-rate idiot.
And he knows it, which makes him phenomenal.
"Bruno, do you get it? They've got us by the balls. They push us into specializing in concrete, routine, alienating tasks. We're machines, for fuck's sake—machines with specific functionalities. No room for error, no room to branch out. Boxed in, we build our cages and our graves. Life slips away. And worse, by mastering one thing and one thing only, we lose everything. No leverage, no negotiating power—with companies, with anyone. We're forced to accept shitty wages because the one thing we know how to do, too many others know it too. And then they fire us. And at fifty, who has the strength to start over? They squeeze us dry, Bruno, and in the end, they screw us."
"You're absolutely right. Yeah, totally right." His eyes light up. "Machines, that's what we are. We can't even afford to make mistakes anymore. Take me, for example; take me!" His theatrical tone, that way he mocks everyone—me, himself, the whole world—is in full force. But today, he seems more focused, as if I've hit on something that truly belongs to him. "Take me," he repeats, more agitated now. "If I hadn't forgotten to buckle my seatbelt, I wouldn't be here!" He bursts out laughing. "A mistake saved me. A mistake! Nobody values mistakes anymore, imperfection. Everything's so mechanical, so… predetermined."
Twenty days ago, in the dead of night, Bruno crashed his car. The unbuckled seatbelt allowed him to be thrown out of the window as the car flipped. A few cracked ribs, some abrasions, and he walked away. As I said, a total idiot.
He's on a roll now: "Francesco, the universal man—remember him? Goethe's universal man is dead. Vanished. Gone. 'Life no longer exists; it slips away from us,'" he repeats, wrapping my words in his frantic delivery. "We're machines. Slaves to a frenzied, identical, repetitive existence. Where's the magic? Where's the improvisation?" He pauses as if searching the air for something, then reignites. "Francesco, where are the number 10s? This kind of football doesn't want them anymore. They're a dying breed: today, it's all about muscles, stats, data. Kilometers run, completed passes. Or better yet, misplaced passes, wasted plays, kilometers not run. A player who doesn't defend, who messes up for ninety minutes but then, with two flashes of brilliance, wins you the game… no one wants them anymore. There's no space for men who don't follow rules, who are everywhere and nowhere, who are everything and nothing. Totti, Ronaldinho, Baggio. Platini, Cassano, Riquelme. And him, the greatest of all time: Diego Armando Maradona. We're erasing them in the name of efficiency, which destroys everything—even love."
I stay silent for a moment. I look at Bruno and revel in having a friend capable of such hyperbolic connections. But he's right. I tell him so. I do what he usually does with me—I humor him. "There's no poetry left in football. Just tactics and records to break. The logic of accumulation has stolen the soul of the ball." He doesn't hear me. He's a torrent now.
"But do you remember what Dinho did? No, no, really: do you remember or not? The one at Milanello was strong, sure. He joked around with the ball and made us smile. But I'm talking about the other Ronaldinho. The one who scored that goal against Chelsea. You know the one I mean. He was standing there, motionless. Surrounded by defenders, like a bull in the arena. And what does he do? Tac. He dances, Francè. He dances! A feint, two, and then stillness. A swivel of the hips, flair, unmistakable love. And then, he places it in the net, like magic."
Bruno raises his hands as if calling to the heavens. "That wasn't a goal. It was poetry. And do you know why? Because it was unpredictable. No training, no stat, no machine could have ever imagined it. It was a moment of madness, of genius, of art. Art, Francè. Isn't that what's missing today? Isn't that what they're taking away from us?"
I nod because I can't do otherwise. And he goes on, more impassioned now, almost shouting. "Look at football today: tactics, pressing, high ball recovery, zones, quick transitions. It all works, sure. But where are the plays? Where are the flashes of genius, the inventions? In that goal, there was everything: theater, tragedy, improvisation. Ronaldinho was an actor. And us, in the stands or in front of the TV, the audience. And today? What show do they give us? Numbers, stats, kilometers. The players don't play anymore. They produce. They consume the pitch—and themselves. And us? We consume ourselves watching them."
Bruno pauses, just to catch his breath. "And it's not just football, Francè. It's everything. Life is like this now. Everything has to work; everything has to be calculated. There are no more Ronaldinhos out there. No more gestures that are reckless, useless, but beautiful. Nobody takes risks anymore. Why? Because they've convinced us that risk is wrong and failure is a sin. But they don't get it: failure is everything, Francesco. Man is a failure. A god that never came to be. A total wretch. That's where the goals come from—the ones that make you jump out of your seat and scream, 'What the hell did he just do?!'"
"You're right," I say. "You should write about this. It's a brilliant point! Failure is the prelude to the heroic nature of all humanity, and we're forgetting it. Football is nothing but a universal language, a modern epic. But the actors, the heroes who communicate the most—the anarchists of the ball—have been reduced to statistical perfection."
"So much joy denied, Francesco. In life, in football, in love! So many men, with immeasurable, unruly talent, will find themselves alone with a ball at their feet, juggling in solitude, wondering:
AND NOW?
WITH ALL THIS TALENT?
WITH ALL THIS LIFE?
WHAT DO I DO WITH IT?
