Free The Keeper: A Life of Saving Goals and Achieving Them by Tim Howard Page B

minutes.
    “I guess I’ve got to go,” I said .
    “I have a funny feeling we’ll talk again soon,” she said, grinning widely.
    I grinned right back. “Yeah,” I said. “Me, too.”
    W e did talk again soon—later that day, in fact, then every day and night thereafter. Our conversations often lasted for four or five hours straight. It wasn’t long before I visited her in Memphis. She introduced me to maybe a hundred relatives—uncles and aunts, cousins and nieces and nephews, her parents, her brother Jerry—and though I struggled to keep the faces and names straight, I loved being around this enormous family. I loved the way they welcomed me as if I’d always been one of them.
    Within a few months, Laura and I were already imagining the dog we’d get together.
    “Let’s name him Clayton,” she said, and I agreed.
    Pretty soon we moved on to the child we’d have, too.
    “We’ll name our son Jacob,” she said.
    Once again, I agreed.
    It was wonderful in all the ways that falling in love is wonderful—we felt carefree and giddy. Laura was easy to talk to, easy to laugh with. And so, so easy to fall in love with.
    T he end of that MetroStars season, on the other hand, was anything but easy. We still weren’t clicking as a team, and I was starting to worry that we never would. Not only had we lost our final three games of the year, we were one of only two MLS teams that failed to reach the playoffs.
    T hen I heard rumblings.
    Bob Bradley’s in.
    Bradley’s going to be our coach.
    We hired Bob Bradley.
    Bob had coached at Princeton, so he’d been active in the New Jersey soccer world. He was tactically smart, he drove his team hard, and he was a straight shooter who told you exactly what he thought.
    When your team is struggling, when you’ve endured loss after loss and you’re trying to find the light, and then you hear that a guy like Bob Bradley is coming to your rescue, you think, Hey, maybe this is the end of all that other nonsense. Maybe Bob Bradley’s going to change things. Finally.
    A s the 2003 season kicked off, things were going well for me on all fronts—I was head over heels for Laura. Bob Bradley was, in fact, coaching the MetroStars. I was selected to train with the national team in Los Angeles; because the starting keepers Kasey Keller and Brad Friedel were busy in their English Premier League seasons, I saw some quality playing time. Dan had negotiated a better contract for me, so I was making decent money—not the European mega-salary that I’d dreamed of, but good money nonetheless.
    Then one day, still early in the season, my phone rang, displaying a number I didn’t recognize. When I answered, the voice on the other end spoke quickly, in a crisp British accent.
    Tim Howard? Tony Coton here. I’m the goalkeeping coach at Manchester United. We’ve seen some tapes of you play, and we’re a bit interested. No need to do anything. Just wanted to let you know we’ve got our eyes on you. Maybe we’ll even come see you play sometime down the road. Take care.
    When you get a call like that, things register in different stages. British voice . . . not a name I know . . . Manchester United.
    And then: Holy cow. Manchester United!
    After Coton hung up, I stared at the phone. It had happened so fast, part of me wondered if it had happened at all.
    Manchester United was the most famous club team in the world. It held the record for the most English Premier League titles: fifteen in total, seven of them in the previous decade alone. A few years ago, they’d become the first team in history to win a “continental treble”—the Premier League, the FA Cup, and the UEFA Champions League, all in a single season.
    United not only attracted stars, they made stars. Irish legend George Best, the so-called “fifth Beatle” who inspired the line “Maradona Good, Pelé Great, George Best,” had played for Man U. Peter Schmeichel, one of the greatest goalkeepers of all time, was also a