Socrates has the answer to Scotland's problems

IT’S 4pm and dusk is falling over Portobello beach. Socrates, football’s philosopher-king, is ruminating over the state of the Scottish game and advocating a novel way of picking a new national manager.

Wrapped inside a blue Puffa jacket, cigarettes conspicuous by their absence, Brazil’s World Cup captain of 1982 and 1986 agrees that a national referendum is the way to find Berti Vogts’ successor. He’d made a similar suggestion back home and his logic is seductive.

"It’s a fantastic idea," he says. "Everybody is involved in the work of the coach and it affects the whole nation, so why shouldn’t the people have a say? Sometimes they can know more than the guys in power."

It’s cold, but not too cold, and Socrates has spent the last 40 minutes signing autographs, posing for pictures and playing keepy-uppy with the kids form Towerbank Primary School, none of whom had probably heard of him before yesterday. They’re too young to remember, off course, although their dads sure do. For men of a certain age Socrates is the ultimate football maverick: a bearded, chain-smoking, beer-drinking, patient-curing, goal-scoring genius who combined sublime football with political activism and a career in medicine.

Burnt on to the memory in yellow and blue, Socrates was the kingpin of the greatest Brazilian side never to win the World Cup. Tall and elegant, he pulled the strings in 1982 in Spain for a team laced with talent. His speciality was the backheel, prompting Pele to famously remark that Socrates played better backwards than most footballers did forwards.

So why is he here? Porty beach is no Copacabana after all. Step forward Simon Clifford, manager of Garforth Town in the Northern Counties East League and founder of 600 Brazilian soccer schools in the UK, one of which is being run in Portobello by Bryan Robertson.

It was Clifford who persuaded Socrates, 50, to come to Yorkshire, pull on his boots again and play on Saturday as a substitute for Garforth in a top-of-the-table clash with Tadcaster Albion. "The point is not playing football," Socrates said. "The point is Simon’s project and I’ve fallen in love with it."

He’s not the only one. Sir Clive Woodward has spent the last two days with Clifford, hoping to glean some knowledge from the amiable Middlesbrough fan who’s fast gaining a reputation in England as a football visionary. Tomorrow, Clifford and Socrates will meet Sir Alex Ferguson.

But back to Portobello and Socrates’ proposed plebiscite to find a new manager. A referendum in Scotland would likely return Gordon Strachan as winner, which brings us neatly back to 1982 and a warm night in Seville when Strachan and Socrates locked horns in a World Cup match which will forever be remembered for Dave Narey’s wonder-goal. Remembered by everyone, that is, except Socrates.

When prompted yesterday, the great Brazilian looked blank, Narey’s toe-poke as fresh in the memory as the day he was born. He eventually plays ball with the TV cameras and utters "Ahh David Narey," mock-knowingly.

He’s more lucid on other aspects of the ’82 game. "He remembers a lot about it because it was a spectacular game and a good game," Clifford - his translator - assures us. "And he remembers after the game because they had a few beers and a party."

Narey’s goal had given Scotland the lead but Zico, Oscar, Eder and Falcao had other ideas and Brazil won 4-1.

"We weren’t preoccupied by going behind because we were very confident," Socrates confirms. "We were one of the best teams in the world. We were Brazil. It wasn’t a problem."

And with that he was off into the Edinburgh night, keen to see the castle. He may play again for Garforth on Saturday when Pontefract are the visitors, but then it’s back to Brazil to pursue other projects: a play he’s writing, and a thesis on why football should be nine-a-side.

A football-philosopher’s work is never done.