"Goalkeeper we sort by leaving alone. Wayne is thirty-one. Steve Mandanda is thirty-three and Marseille have rung Steve twice this season trying to buy him back and they will ring again in May. Steve has said no to both. Steve will say no in May."

"They will keep ringing."

"They will keep ringing. He’s their boy. We’re not selling him. He came here last summer and signed a three-year deal and he meant it. Then there’s Pope. Pope is twenty-five. Pope came in last August and the Holmesdale have not stopped singing his name since the penalty save at Bournemouth in October.

Three keepers, all good enough to start for half the league. The lad your supporters call a hero is on the bench more often than not because Wayne is Welsh number one and Steve is World Cup squad for France. We do not sign a fourth. We lose somebody in the dressing room if we do."

"So no signing if nothing happens."

"Yes, no signing. Marcus keeps eyes open the way he always keeps eyes open. We do not move unless somebody falls in our lap. The position is sorted."

"Midfield."

"Centre and defensive mid. We are deep. Rúben, Mili, Mateo if we land him, McArthur, and Nya at eighteen with a year of first-team minutes under his belt since you brought him up last April. Five names that cover ninety against anybody. We look at one. Portuguese kid called Vitinha in Porto B team. That’s the name. We are not signing this window unless it falls in our lap. We are scouting."

He sat back.

"That’s the list. Left-back is the signing. Right-back and centre-half are the planning. Goalkeeper is sorted. Midfield is the watch. Four positions on a board. One name decided. Three to discuss between now and the window."

"And the academy."

"Three on first-team contracts in June. Olise gets the upgrade and maybe a boot deal. Aviero gets the upgrade. Mitchell gets the upgrade. Three more out on Championship loans. Hannam also gets a loan in the summer."

"James and Mateo."

"Both still loanees. James’s loan ends in June with no option in the deal. Madrid will sell. Zidane has stopped pretending. Jorge knows. They will take a fair fee with bonuses. James says yes the day we offer."

"Mateo."

"Mateo is the harder one. No buy clause in his loan. No automatic. The loan ends in June and Madrid have him back unless we convince them to sell. Jorge tells me they are open. The lad wants to stay. We negotiate from May. It is a real conversation. Not a clause we tick. We will land him. But it is not done until the paperwork is signed."

"We want them."

"We want them."

He shut the tablet. Picked the coffee up. Drained the rest.

"Daniel."

"Yeah."

"I walked in here ten minutes ago and you’d just dropped two points away at Tony Pulis on the day Coppell sat in the front row of the away end. I walk out in another ten knowing James signs in June, Mateo we have a fighting chance of signing in June if the negotiation goes our way, the best young left-back in Europe walks into Beckenham on a Tuesday in July, and we have backup on a board for two other positions Marcus has been to foreign leagues for. That is the afternoon. The two points are the small bit."

"That is the afternoon."

"Salzburg first."

"Salzburg first."

He stood up. Shook my hand. Picked up the empty cup. Took it with him out the door.

I sat on the bench by the door for another minute. Then I picked up my jacket and went to the bus.

[M40. 18:55 GMT.]

Sarah was in her usual seat. The Salzburg iPad open. Marco Rose’s diamond on the screen. She did not say anything for ten minutes.

"City beat Everton three-one. Four clear with eight to go."

"Four."

"Seven from eight to tie. Eight from eight to pass."

"Maths got harder."

"Maths is not done."

She turned a page on the iPad. Then she said:

"Theo."

"How did you know."

"Marcus wrote it twice. Left-back. Left-back only. He doesn’t write things twice unless he means them. You will not argue with Marcus when he means something."

"You wanted Hakimi yesterday."

"I want Hakimi yesterday. I want Theo tomorrow. I will be happy with Theo on Tuesday."

"All right."

"He’ll be a problem in the dressing room for three months."

"I know."

"Sakho will hate him for three months and love him by Christmas."

"I know."

"Ben will hate him for six."

"I know."

"And in his third year he will be a better player than he is now because of Theo."

"That’s the plan."

She turned a page on the iPad. The diamond came back. The conversation about the left-back was over. The conversation about Salzburg had not started. She let me sit with it the rest of the way.

[Beckenham. 19:40 GMT.]

The car park was empty when the bus pulled in. The players had been deposited at the gate and gone to their cars. Sarah had gone home to her flat. The Salzburg iPad had gone with her.

I’d told her I was going to the office for ten minutes to check email. She’d told me not to lie to her. I hadn’t answered.

The lights came on as I walked through reception. The cleaners had been through. My office on the first floor smelled faintly of lemon spray and faintly of wet kit. I shut the door. I sat at the desk for two minutes without doing anything.

Then I got up and took the framed photo off the wall behind my desk. The Carabao Cup lift at Wembley in February. Mili holding the trophy two-handed. Sakho’s arms round his waist from behind. Konaté in the foreground with his arms in the air. The whole bench piling on. Between Mili’s elbow and the trophy handle, if you looked carefully, you could see me at the bottom of the pile, half-buried, looking straight up at the lights.

The safe was behind the frame. Brushed steel. Combination keypad. I turned the dial. Frankie’s birthday. Then Mum’s. The lock turned with the small sigh of well-fitted metal.

The box was the only thing in there.

Charcoal velvet, thin and flat, small enough to fit in the palm of one hand. I lifted it out and sat back down at the desk and opened it under the lamp.

The band was platinum, thin but not flimsy. Six narrow claws holding a single round stone just above the line of the band. The stone was about the size of half a pea. It caught the lamp every time I moved my hand and threw the light back at the ceiling in different colours.

Jessica had told me on Friday it was an Edwardian setting and I should look up what that meant before I asked any more questions. I’d looked it up that night.

Edwardian meant somebody around nineteen-oh-something had thought a ring should look like this, and Emma had a hundred-year-old Cartier on her left wrist, and that was the whole reason Jessica had picked it.

She’d also said the stone was just over a carat and the four numbers that mattered all came back the best they came back. I’d nodded as if I had any idea what she meant.

There was a small slip of paper folded under the velvet cushion. Jessica’s handwriting.

Size five and a half. Fits her left ring finger. The Cartier fits her left wrist. Your fiancée has taste, Daniel. So does your agent. J.

I read it twice. Folded it back. Closed the box.

The decision was the decision. After the season. Not now.

If I asked her tonight she’d say yes and the next thirty-six hours would be the BBC website and her father in Devon and my mother in Manchester ringing every neighbour on her street, and on Thursday night I was flying to Salzburg to manage a Europa League quarter-final. The ring was not a quarter-final.

I put the box back in the safe. Shut the door. Twisted the dial. Hung the photograph back on the wall. Turned off the desk lamp and went home.

***

Thank you to Sir nameyelus for the support.