On a night when a rat was a cause for so much misery last Tuesday, Salomon Kalou provided me the comfort I deserved.
This nuisance of a rat has caused pain in my life—the pangs growing at an alarming rate in the last two weeks.
The climax was Tuesday when I realised this rat had ‘drilled’ holes in my favourite clothes; and most of all, my choicest Bruno Banani underwear. I was about to wear it to ‘some function’ that same night and I sat agonising over the predicament.
Moments later, I bumped into this naughty rat into the corridor and thrust a kick aimed at its head, but this ‘Lionel Messi’ caused even more misery by selling me a dummy, leaving me with a twisted ankle from hitting the wall in my desperate miss.
With my swollen leg covered in ice and bandage, the only thing I could do was sit and watch my Chelsea taking on Benfica in the Uefa Champions League quarter-final tie.
And there comes Kalou bringing me the timely comfort by netting the lone goal of the match. That was as simple as cheeks of a newly born baby, nothing was forced—a simple tap-in that I am sure gave even the Queen reason to smile in the comfort of her Buckingham Palace.
And that the lone goal, that gave the only team from the Queen’s land still in the elite competition the spring in their step going into the second leg Tuesday night, came from a fellow African, added spice to the occasion.
An African had done the magic proving that there is more about this continent than the tales of famine, disease and political unrest degenerating into civil wars. Hopefully, next year it will be our own Robin Ngalande turning on the magic for Atletico Madrid. Hopefully, Luka Milanzi will stop growing ‘younger’ so that we can perhaps watch him in our own CAF Champions League next year.
Chelsea are near qualifying for the semi-finals of the lucrative competition and, hopefully, another African, Didier Drogba, will do us proud in the second leg by completing the task and the Blues can fancy their chances of a semi-final against Barcelona? Possibly! Or a dream final against Jose Mourinho’s Real Madrid!
