Vincent Kompany: failure is not an option
Whether talking sport or world affairs, the Manchester City footballer is a man who comes armed with opinions
I grew up near the red light district in Brussels, in the area around the north railway station,” says Vincent Kompany. “You didn’t get much rougher than there. Prostitution, drugs, a troubled neighbourhood . . . Now I live in a completely different context.” Even if Kompany were not an absurdly articulate (in four languages), deep-thinking sportsman, you’d guess his background might give him perspective.
How do you get a handle on life inside the world’s most moneyed — and apparently melodramatic — football team? A place where a troubled midfielder’s nightclub arrest, or an England international being stung by an internet scam (events befalling Michael Johnson and Micah Richards recently) hardly registers on the chart of headlines it generates. Where even Stephen Ireland can no longer get in the news. You couldn’t do better than ask a Kompany man.
Manchester City can seem worthy of Bayern Munich’s old nickname, “FC Hollywood”, but their sage and sanguine Belgian says the off-field stuff is froth. Beyond lies a group of serious footballers ready to achieve, no matter how their club is portrayed. “We’ve gone through managerial changes, a lot of negative press, faced teams who don’t normally pay attention to City and now want to beat us. We’ve had stories, like Ade in Angola [Emmanuel Adebayor caught in an ambush of the Togo team], Robbie [Robinho], who was a good player and left us, the situation of Wayne [Bridge] . . .
“There’s a lot of stuff and that makes it remarkable for us to be where we are,” Kompany says. Attention peaked before City’s superb victory at Chelsea, when the furore caused by John Terry’s affair with Bridge’s ex-partner seemed to inspire teammates to “win it for Wayne”.
“There’s no such thing for us as trouble in the media, “ says Kompany. “We’re all grown-up people. Something happens in the newspaper and it’s like a piece of theatre, you know? You go and once you come out real life starts again. For us, if it was a problem for a particular player, we did like we’d do for anyone in the group, supported him, got him back in the team and made it easy for him to perform. Wayne did that brilliantly. There’s a good spirit because it’s kind of been us against the world and there’s a connection with our fans because of that. Chelsea was the moment when that was rewarded but for me the game against Sunderland [today] is the one to show who we are. There’s no point winning at Chelsea if you don’t win at Sunderland.
“I think we’ve had a good season, losing the least amount of league games — which is never mentioned — and it’s funny how [media] people think their opinion on City matters when we really don’t care about it.”
Kompany, at one point, begins a discourse on post-globalisation (“I’ve travelled that much at a young age the identity thing, for me, has become very vague. The world’s so small I find it more and more difficult to accept any culture is ‘foreign’ ” . . . it’s not a conversation I’ve ever had with Joey Barton). Issues of perception and reality interest him. The outlay of City’s giddyingly rich owner, Sheikh Mansour, is why, he believes, his club are reported differently. “Fine, Tottenham and Aston Villa can have a perfect, wonderful season and we’ll have a bad one and finish fourth,” he says archly. “I don’t see why there should be more expectations on City. Villa and Tottenham have good squads and invested money, too. They’ve got players who’ve been together a while, whereas we’ve come together in a short space of time.
“Players are bought by money but we’re not playing dollar bills, you know? We’re all people who live the dream, who worked hard when we were younger to get to the stage where we’d be chosen to play for a club like this. The money doesn’t represent for us what it does to the outside world.”
Not all City transfers are huge. Kompany arrived from Hamburg for only £6m when Mansour’s takeover was a few days from completion in 2008. That is less than Liverpool paid for Andrea Dossena, Villa for Curtis Davies and Tottenham for Alan Hutton.
The irony is that England’s most lavish buyers may have bought the bargain of recent years. Kompany looked good — sensible, mobile, competitive, technical — when used by Mark Hughes in central midfield. He looks world-beating, potentially, now Roberto Mancini has moved him to centre-half. “I’ve said I’m happiest in midfield but I’m just as good in both positions and wherever I play my objectives don’t change, I’ll try and be the best,” Kompany says. “England was always where I’d make my career. I love everything about the game here. I’m happy I can get into my challenges without always being carded.
“Tactically, Mancini is a mastermind and makes it very clear he likes his team to be disciplined and build from the back. That suits me. The thing about my positions, midfield or defence, is if the team concedes you’re accountable and that’s perfect. I like responsibilities and pressure.”
Supporters see Kompany, who signed a five-year contract in October, as their future club captain. It’s hard to believe he’s just 23. By 17 he was already a Champions League stand-out with Anderlecht and coveted by such as Manchester United, but remained in Belgium for the sake of his development. Injuries spoilt his stay at Hamburg and last season he continued for City despite a broken foot, receiving eight injections per game to play.
He returns to his background to explain his determination. “My father came from Africa. He had to flee his country [then Zaire] because of [the bloody dictator] Mobutu, because he was a rebellious student. He came to Belgium to make a living driving taxis at night and study at university during the days. As my father said to me once, he didn’t come to Europe to fail and I keep that with me. My father didn’t come all this way for me to mess it up,” Kompany says. “And my mother was the strongest woman I ever met.”
Jocelyne, his mother, died of cancer and his sister, Christel, was also afflicted before getting the all-clear after treatment. We met at the Royal Oldham Hospital, where Kompany visited the new £17m Christie Radiotherapy Centre. Christie is a standard-bearing cancer hospital supported by City and the Oldham is the first in a network of satellite centres.
“One thing I found from my mum and sister is cancer sufferers become much stronger than the rest of us. Things like that, and what I’ve seen when in Africa for my charity, means it will take a lot before somebody makes me think what I do tomorrow — in football — will decide the fate of the world.”
It would be remiss not to ask a player with such perspective about the perception of footballers. “We’re just a normal section of society, seen under a magnifying glass. We make mistakes like everybody and the positive stuff is put in the shadows. I’ve seen people outside football who earn lots of money never give anything to charity and be praised for having a ‘humble lifestyle’ because maybe they don’t drink.
“And I’ve seen footballers in their 20s who flash money on cars or champagne, but also build hospitals. The guy spending his cash in the nightclub could also be the guy helping a village in South America.”
Kompany adds with a smile: “And if the footballer buys a big car, isn’t that good for your economy too . . ?”
