Barrie Davies’s journey to the Champions League Final takes a turn when he finds a rundown flat, smelly bar, and ‘Magic Messi Milk’ between himself and Paris. Part one of a two-part series.

Champions League Final Paris Liverpool Banter Bar Travel Politics Football Paradise — **Art by Shivani Khot**

I can remember the last time I was in Paris like it was only yesterday.

Which is passing strange, for by rights, given the sordid ensemble of mind-altering and memory-blunting things I got up to the last time I was in Paris, I shouldn’t be capable of remembering one man-jack or neon strobed flash of nipple or an absinthe-splashed panty or any passing sliver of it. Not even if a tea-soaked Madeleine passed my lips.

By the mercy of God, my Fixer had performed all the arduous donkey work in advance and secured – or at least he assured me he’d “secured” – not only two tickets for the Champions League Final being played in the City of Light but also a premium set of press credentials that included, as a side perk, entrance to a free pre and post-match bar. I have to tell you now, ladies and gents, that my Fixer – whom we will now henceforth refer to as “My Associate” – has a very elastic and entirely malleable notion of what the conventional meaning of the past tense of the verb “secured” can mean. Let us simply say, at this juncture and at the risk of baiting the hook and indulging in some scene setting and foreshadowing, that my Associate harbours a very elastic understanding of the term “secured” indeed; the elasticity of which stretches patience, credulity and peace of mind. In sum, my Associate errs on the side of a uniquely radical and unconventional regard for what is deemed “secured” in the present context. Or, for that matter, in any conceivable context. But now, your appetite suitably whetted and your trousers saturated by a puddle of drool, I’ll leave the aforementioned hanging tantalisingly and return to the meat of the nub.