sábado, outubro 21, 2006
Hilario(us)
Is having a silly name an advantage?
Hilario's heroics for Chelsea against Barcelona were surely the reaction of man desperate to prove his name wrong.
Barney Ronay
October 21, 2006 01:00 AM
It wasn't hard to imagine what we might get from the Chelsea goalkeeper Hilario this week. Shunted into the limelight against Barcelona in bizarre circumstances, Hilario appeared little more than a punchline waiting to happen. The first mention of the mysterious Portuguese third-string conjured an image of some cartwheeling hysteric: a pointer, a flapper, a man with wild and unruly tracksuit bottoms. It wasn't just his name. We heard talk of a famously gaffe-strewn showing against Manchester United. There were references to his wealthy upbringing and university education: the pampered Hilario emerges from his ivory tower to flail and simper in the Stamford Bridge goalmouth. But mainly it was just the fact that he was called Hilario.
Names are very important in football. The most promising Scotland team of recent times took the field at Euro 92 with an unbreakable backbone of seven players called "Mc" (McKimmie, McStay. McPherson, McCall, McAllister, McCoist and McClair). Brazil's mastery of the arresting football moniker has always been closely linked to its domination of the game itself. Not that Brazilian names have ever been happy just standing still. The days have long gone when a typical player might be called something like Djalminho Juninoberto. After a brief experiment with the flashy (Wagner, Mozart and Bismarck all played in Germany recently) a generation of prosaic and almost wilfully dull single-name Brazilian footballers has emerged. Recent exports have included the strikers Jo, Fred and Alan and the defender Roger, who sound more like a pub five-a-side team than men capable of performing 17 stepovers and an overhead donkey kick.
English football has always been deeply conservative in this area. Popular early names like Cecil Wingfield-Stratford and Cuthbert Ottoway, England's first captain, were replaced en masse during the game's Golden Age, with its hordes of Alfs, Stans and Tommys. More recently the 1980s were marked by the brutalist monotony of the Paul-Gary-Trevor era. One study after the 1986 World Cup produced the alarming statistical projection that by 2004 every single player in English football would be called "Gary Stevens".
Sadly, genuinely silly names have rarely coincided with success on the field. Australia once had a goalkeeper called Norman Conquest. Harry Daft won five England caps, while Segar Bastard fell out of favour after just one. Of current players The Seychelles' Johnny Moustache has yet to hit the big time, while midfielder Frank Awanka remains unknown outside Luxembourg.
Which brings us back to the man himself: Hilario! What a presence! The Chelsea stand-in was utterly unflappable against Barcelona. Would a goalkeeper not steeled by a long struggle with his own unfortunate surname have been so ready to rush out and block Lionel Messi's early shot? Without his troublingly pointless university education would he have had the presence of mind to flop heroically on top of harmless strikes at goal, wasting valuable seconds? Possibly not.
Even better news for Chelsea fans. Should Hilario go missing they now have a ready-made deputy on the bench. His name? Yves Makabu Ma Kalambay.
Hilario's heroics for Chelsea against Barcelona were surely the reaction of man desperate to prove his name wrong.
Barney Ronay
October 21, 2006 01:00 AM
It wasn't hard to imagine what we might get from the Chelsea goalkeeper Hilario this week. Shunted into the limelight against Barcelona in bizarre circumstances, Hilario appeared little more than a punchline waiting to happen. The first mention of the mysterious Portuguese third-string conjured an image of some cartwheeling hysteric: a pointer, a flapper, a man with wild and unruly tracksuit bottoms. It wasn't just his name. We heard talk of a famously gaffe-strewn showing against Manchester United. There were references to his wealthy upbringing and university education: the pampered Hilario emerges from his ivory tower to flail and simper in the Stamford Bridge goalmouth. But mainly it was just the fact that he was called Hilario.
Names are very important in football. The most promising Scotland team of recent times took the field at Euro 92 with an unbreakable backbone of seven players called "Mc" (McKimmie, McStay. McPherson, McCall, McAllister, McCoist and McClair). Brazil's mastery of the arresting football moniker has always been closely linked to its domination of the game itself. Not that Brazilian names have ever been happy just standing still. The days have long gone when a typical player might be called something like Djalminho Juninoberto. After a brief experiment with the flashy (Wagner, Mozart and Bismarck all played in Germany recently) a generation of prosaic and almost wilfully dull single-name Brazilian footballers has emerged. Recent exports have included the strikers Jo, Fred and Alan and the defender Roger, who sound more like a pub five-a-side team than men capable of performing 17 stepovers and an overhead donkey kick.
English football has always been deeply conservative in this area. Popular early names like Cecil Wingfield-Stratford and Cuthbert Ottoway, England's first captain, were replaced en masse during the game's Golden Age, with its hordes of Alfs, Stans and Tommys. More recently the 1980s were marked by the brutalist monotony of the Paul-Gary-Trevor era. One study after the 1986 World Cup produced the alarming statistical projection that by 2004 every single player in English football would be called "Gary Stevens".
Sadly, genuinely silly names have rarely coincided with success on the field. Australia once had a goalkeeper called Norman Conquest. Harry Daft won five England caps, while Segar Bastard fell out of favour after just one. Of current players The Seychelles' Johnny Moustache has yet to hit the big time, while midfielder Frank Awanka remains unknown outside Luxembourg.
Which brings us back to the man himself: Hilario! What a presence! The Chelsea stand-in was utterly unflappable against Barcelona. Would a goalkeeper not steeled by a long struggle with his own unfortunate surname have been so ready to rush out and block Lionel Messi's early shot? Without his troublingly pointless university education would he have had the presence of mind to flop heroically on top of harmless strikes at goal, wasting valuable seconds? Possibly not.
Even better news for Chelsea fans. Should Hilario go missing they now have a ready-made deputy on the bench. His name? Yves Makabu Ma Kalambay.
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