Humiliation…it’s an art!

Dijkshoorn’ column in VI. He makes me laugh .

Over the last weeks, we were entertained with this exciting drama from Madrid. Everyone thinks it’s shameful what they do, but if you ask me, they can keep on doing this for a while. I highly enjoy myself.

In an interview Wesley Sneijder said that Huntelaar couldn’t train with the big boys but had to play foot-volleyball with the youth players. “Klaas Jan doesn’t deserve this!”.

I wish I saw that. Because, that takes skill: to foot-volley and to be angry at the same time. It’s an exhilarating game, footvolley. With lots of yelling and laughing and claiming “the ball was in” and “no, it was out!”. It’s a Brazilian invention, so you know what to expect.

In Brazil they play it inbetween making one or two babies out of wedlock and during the game they chew on a chickenwing. They cheer and they jump on each others back. It’s a game. It’s fun.

A genius move by Pellegrini. Huntelaar needs to play foot-volley, with youth players. It sounds like being left in the play-center at Ikea by your parents. You actually see many Klaasjans there. Kids who want to be picked up by their parents after three minutes and sit sulking in that silly ball-box all afternoon.

You can compare it to the Ferrari boss coming to Holland for training and season prep who lets Michael Schumacher drive rounds in a mini electrical cart in some entertainment park. That’s how this must have felt to Huntelaar.

Playing footvolley with youth players who just start to get hair on their body and from the corner of your eye you spy Cristiano Ronaldo with a ball, with his waxed legs – 50 million euros a piece. That hurts. The humiliation worked. Klaas Jan left. And is able to train with grown ups again in Milan.

Rafael van der Vaart’s suffering hasn’t been declared yet, but I can sense a classic drama there. Less than a year ago he was shining with pride. In his fave city, Madrid. Rafael was home at last. His gramps had met Di Stefano who later quipped he was jealous he wasn’t Raf’s grand father. And Sylvie was already best friends with the gay Real Madrid hairdresser.

But Raf is being humiliated too and wants out. In a couple of weeks you can read how Rafael was relegated to driving around in a second hand van to deliver smoked hams to Real board members. Every night he’d come home with his apron all dirty with blood.

The humiliation…it’s a balancing act. You have to take everyting into account. The bigger the ego, the harder it hurts. Ruud Gullit is humiliated if you don’t think he’s Nelson Mandela’s only son. And there are more people easily humiliated.

Let Eto’o mow your lawn and he’s out of here. Mido is insulted when you don’t tell him his hair smells nice. Beenhakker acts the man of the street, but give him a bucket of soap and ask him to clean up the outside of De Kuip and he’ll walk. “I won’t be dicked around!”.

In Holland, we don’t do humiliation so well. Spain is far superior. Mario Been took his captain Roy Makaay off the pitch. A very smart humiliation. To be replaced as a captain is the ultimate form of humiliation. Maybe because you get that clumsy behaviour with the captain’s band… And you can’t hide or sneak off the pitch. The whole stadium is watching you taking that band of and giving it to someone else. You have failed! See, any player would be sick to his stomach the whole season. But not Roy Makaay.

He’ll just check it out, two games on the bench. His new role as benchwarmer. To move to Greece and play there. And score there. You can’t humiliate Makaay. You need passion for a club and an ego for that. Makaay is a bread player. He loves the club that pays him and plays him. Some players dream to play for Feyenoord, in that classic red-white shirt, their whole life.

Peter van Vossen ran naked through Zeeland, with a Feyenoord flag, when the Stadium club signed him. Nicky Hofs would even play in overalls. Makaay sees Feyenoord as a club where he needs to score. If it doesn’t work, he’ll go someplace else.

No worries. You can’t humiliate Makaay. Makaay humiliates you.