““Someone once tried to explain to me why football is so endlessly fascinating to its fans. It was all to do with unpredictability and consequences, he said. If you studied any match closely, you could trace how one bad pass, a missed tackle, a fluffed corner, a reckless clearance or an untrapped ball could, after seven, ten, fifteen further moves, be responsible for a crucial goal. It was, I suppose, a version of that””