Messi’s coming! His fans, including Gil, are ready

Some people might think this might be going a tad overboard, but I could relate.

Back in 1975, I didn’t wear the green and yellow colors of the Brazilian legend Pele, but I did drive 11 hours to Los Angeles just to see him — and I was 26.

At the time, I was getting settled into my journalism career at the Deseret News, assigned to cover the high school sports beat. I also had the women’s golf beat, the Bonneville Salt Flats beat and the soccer beat, which I volunteered for.

I liked soccer. I had played at BYU. My twin brother Dee also played at the Y and then briefly one summer for the Salt Lake Golden Spikers, Utah’s first professional team (by rule, they had to have at least four Americans on the roster; he was one of them).

We learned the language. It was a match, not a game; a pitch, not a field; and you couldn’t use your hands. We knew what offsides was. We were soccer geeks before there were soccer geeks.

Then, seemingly out of the blue, the New York Cosmos of the North American Soccer League announced they had signed Pele, who was 34 and on the downward slide of his career. Pele had won three World Cups with Brazil. In over 1,000 matches as a pro, he averaged nearly a goal per match. To come to America, a soccer backwater where they didn’t even call football football, the Cosmos paid him $2.8 million over three years — the richest contract to that point in sports history. It was a big deal … in Sao Paulo, at least.

New York Cosmos' Pele gestures during a press conference in New York, Sept. 29, 1977. | Ira Schwarz, Associated Press

I explained just how big a deal it was to George Ferguson, our sports editor. He looked at me like I’d suggested we cover a shuffleboard tournament. But I persisted, wore him down, and he finally agreed the News would pay for the first tank of gas in my VW bug.

I drove straight through to the LA suburb of Torrance, where Pele, in a warm-up to his upcoming NASL debut, was supposed to play at Murdock Stadium in one of those obscure exhibition tournaments soccer seems to always be playing. I say “supposed,” because as it turned out, the Cosmos apparently didn’t want him participating in a non-NASL match, so he didn’t play. But I did stand within 10 feet of him and took his picture. Then I drove home.

I bring this up now, of course, because Inter Miami is playing Real Salt Lake Wednesday night at America First Field in Sandy. Messi-mania is coming to Utah. It’s a hot ticket, hotter than any ticket in RSL’s soccer history. And if you’re wondering: Is Gil going? The answer is yes. The reason? His grandmother.

Gil in his Lionel Messi-inspired pink suit. | Lee Benson, Deseret News

Last fall, when RSL announced the date when tickets for the season would be going on sale, Kerri Benson, a woman who to my knowledge has never in her life intentionally spent money on a sporting event — but who was well aware that Gil had the Messi game circled in red — decided it was time to break that streak. She did her homework; she figured out the RSL system. In October, seconds after ticket sales opened, she was online.

She came away with four tickets. Never underestimate Grandma power. I don’t want to say how much they cost. OK, it was $1,800. But that included three additional RSL matches, which you had to buy if you also wanted the Messi match. So that brought down the average.

Whatever. I’m fine with it. Money well spent, as far as I’m concerned. Fifty-one years ago, I got to see the greatest soccer player in history in person. Wednesday night, I get to see the second greatest.

Please don’t tell Gil I said that.