On Saturday, December 9, 2006, on the south coast of England, not far from the English Channel, at Fratton Park, in the fourteenth minute, Kanu chased the ball nearing midfield with his back to the Everton goal. Everton's Simon Davies chased the ball from the other direction. Davies slid towards Kanu. They converged. As they headed towards opposite sides of each other from where they'd started, both touched the ball, and the ball popped upward, hard to tell just how. It floated lazily over to the right and descended towards Portsmouth's Matthew Taylor, forty-five yards from Everton's goal. Before it could hit the ground, Taylor struck it with his left foot and sent it back upward. I thought he'd struck it casually, almost goofily. I thought he'd struck it in one of those see-what-happens modes. It flew high and flew toward me as I sat in the fifth row behind my fellow American Tim Howard, manning the Everton goal. It sailed to its pinnacle and then gravity beckoned. Here it came, just beginning its descent toward Fratton Park soil, still two-thirds of the way air borne, when there came an instant that would have to rate as one of the best instants you can know upon the earth.
