DWIGHT YORKE had a three-day sunshine break in Malta last week while his Manchester United teammates were playing for their various countries. Unusually, it is the absence of international stimulus, rather than the prospect of it, that fuelled his desire to move to Old Trafford in the summer.
Yorke accepts that he will never get to the World Cup with his native Trinidad and Tobago, and regards the European Champions League as the next best thing. Hence his steely determination to quit Aston Villa for United in August, for that club record £12.6m fee.
With five goals in his first eight games the "Smiley Guy", as he calls himself, is already providing a promising return on that colossal investment, threatening to become the first United player since Brian McClair, back in 1987-88, to score 20 in a league season.
Alex Ferguson, his judgment vindicated again, describes his latest acquisition as "the complete centre-forward", quick in thought and deed and able to hold the ball up and bring others into play, as well as finish "like a natural". Andy Cole with composure.
Some players are unable to cope with the special pressures of playing for the biggest club in the country, and seem to shrink every time they don the famous red shirt to run out at the "Theatre of Dreams". Yorke has been just the opposite, taking to the stage as if born to the big-time.
Nothing could be further from the reality, of course. The newest member of the millionaires club that is Old Trafford knew real, Third World poverty on the tiny Caribbean island of Tobago where, as one of eight siblings, he had to catch land crabs and sell them to tourist restaurants to pay for his football boots.
Spotted by Villa on their 1988 summer tour, and signed on by Graham Taylor just before his 17th birthday, Yorke's has been no meteoric rise to the top. He may sing his praises now, but for a long time Ron Atkinson showed little faith in him, and left him out of the 1994 League Cup final against Manchester United - a decision that still rankles.
Used in a variety of positions, including right wing and midfield, when he did play under Atkinson, it was not until Brian Little took charge that Yorke felt "appreciated". Given his head, and a regular place at last, he became one of the most feared predators in the Premier League, rewarding Little with 45 goals in two seasons. But by November last year he had become disillusioned by Villa's lack of progress and announced his intention to leave: "I went to Brian and told him that I wanted to move on at the end of the season. He wasn't pleased, but he accepted it, and we had a gentlemen's agreement."
As it turned out, it was Little who left first, resigning in February, to be replaced by John Gregory. End of "gentlemen's agreement"; cue the rancour that accompanied Yorke's subsequent transfer: "It was nothing to do with the new manager, his personality or his coaching style. It was just the way I felt, and I did have this agreement with Brian Little. Everything was out in the open, John knew all about it before the end of last season. It was nothing new to him, so I was disappointed with what happened.
"The thing that hurt me most was when he said I didn't try in my last game, at Everton, where I was the only player to have a shot on target. I'd given Aston Villa everything I could possibly give for nine years, and to know that I'd always given 100 per cent and to have the manager say that 10 players gave their all against Everton and that I was the exception was not only hurtful, it was untrue. I wasn't happy with that. He knows, deep down, what the truth is, and it's sad that people should read those comments in the newspapers when, behind the scenes, what went on was very different.
"I ended up shaking John Gregory's hand when I left, and he gave me a big hug and wished me good luck. Then I read in the papers the next day that if he'd had a gun, he would have shot me, and I was stunned. That was very disappointing."
As long ago as March, Yorke had heard through his agent, Tony Stephens, that United were keen to sign him: "Atletico Madrid bid for me last season, but that didn't appeal to me, and a few Italian clubs inquired, but as soon as I knew United wanted me, I had no interest in anyone else."
For a long time, however, Villa stuck out for a prohibitive £16m, until with only two days to go before the Champions League transfer deadline, on August 20, Yorke decided it was time to force the issue, and went public with his desire to play for United.
Ferguson's final offer clinched it, and after a Jules Verne of a search, which had taken him from Chile [for Marcelo Salas] to Holland (Patrick Kluivert] via Italy and Argentina [Gabriel Batistuta], the United manager had found the prolific striker he needed just 80-odd miles down the M6.
Yorke was ecstatic. "Nobody should blame me," he says, "for the fact that this is something I've always wanted to do. Playing for Manchester United gives me the opportunity to play alongside, and against, the very best players around. For instance, I played against Lothar Matthäus the other day. There were times I never dreamed I'd share the same pitch with someone like that.
"I could have stayed at Villa and just gone out to enjoy my football, like I've always done, but I felt this was something I needed to challenge myself with. It had become not exactly easy, but routine just to turn up and play for Villa. I felt to get the best out of myself I needed to take on this challenge."
Despite his old club's flying start to the season [he says Villa's coach Steve Harrison is their "unsung hero"] Yorke has no regrets. The Manchester United experience was everything he expected, and more: "When I was sitting in the dressing-room I looked around and realised I was surrounded by 18 internationals. Being in that company, where everyone is a superstar in their own right, is what I have always wanted."
The intensity of the competition for places was reflected in the variety of partners he has had in his eight games, Yorke ever-present while Cole, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Teddy Sheringham have rotated around him. Cole, last season's leading scorer, had suffered most from the newcomer's arrival, yet he had done most to help his rival settle in.
Yorke says: "He has been fantastic. If I was in his position, I'd be wary of the new guy as someone who was after my place. "Coley" could have been awkward, not talking to me or saying very little, but he has been spot on. He's been taking me around, showing me the ropes, taking me shopping and inviting me to his house for meals. He's my best mate here, no question." Roy Keane had a different sort of welcome waiting. "As soon as I got out on the training pitch, he put in one of those tackles of his to test me. I think it was his way of saying, 'Let's see if you really want that money, and to play for United'."
Yorke's debut, at West Ham, was also a jolting eye-opener: "I was up against players I'd been playing against for years without a problem. Suddenly I found these same guys trying extra hard. The difference astounded me. Every game Manchester United play is like a cup final to the opposition. The so-called easy games are always harder for us. I've learned that and accepted it. The answer is to raise your own game, and I suppose that can only make you a better player."
The learning process did not take long. After the goalless draw at Upton Park, Yorke celebrated his home debut with a couple against Charlton, then scored again in his third game, against Coventry, and with three goals in his first two appearances at home, Old Trafford had a new hero, whose popularity was enhanced by that engaging smile and the wearing of his collar up, à la Cantona, as if in homage to the lamented genius.
The score which has given him greatest satisfaction to date came in the 2-2 draw with Bayern Munich. "My first goal in the Champions League will always been a bit special," he said. "Playing in this competition gives me the chance to prove to people, and myself, how good I am. The opportunity to play at the very top level is something I've been deprived of for the last few years because of the country I play for. I'll never have the chance to play in one with Trinidad and Tobago, so to play with United in Europe is my World Cup."
While the real thing was on, in June, he accompanied a team of thirtysomethings, including Vinnie Jones, Dennis Wise and Gordon Cowans, to a veterans' tournament in Tobago. Back home, they don't like Yorke's dismissal of their international ambitions, or his infrequent appearances for his country, for whom he has not turned out for two years. "I'd love to play for them regularly," he says, "but unfortunately they don't play when England do. Their games tend to clash with important Premiership fixtures, and if I'd always gone back when Trinidad wanted me, and missed a lot of matches here, I might not be where I am today. I do want to put something back, to show people that if I can make it, they can, but at the moment its very difficult."
His standing back home is so high that the islanders are prepared to forgive these sins of omission, as well as a succession of stories about his private life which have led him to dub a couple of the more salacious tabloids the "Sunday Dwight" and the "News of the Yorke".
On their most celebrated ambassador's recommendation, I took my summer holidays on Tobago, an idyllic island measuring 20 miles by 12, with a population of just 50,000 - imagine the Scillies with real sunshine and you have it. Yorke's close friends, Brian Lara and Shaka Hislop, both come from Trinidad [population 1.3m], and he is easily history's most famous Tobagan, eclipsing Claud Noel - a lightweight boxer who fought, unsuccessfully, for the world title in 1981 - after whom the one decent road is named.
The islanders' obsession with their favourite son has to be seen to be believed. Everybody claims to have played with him, from coconut-selling hustlers on the beach to Colvin Hutchinson, who had a trial with Villa at the same time, but didn't make it, and now works at the airport.
At the end of July an earthquake measuring 4.7 on the Richter scale put the fear of God into tourists, but merited only a small, down-page story in the Trinidad and Tobago Guardian, alongside such attention-grabbing headlines as "Man remanded for stealing toilet tank", "Some really great books by white people" and "Cops want proper toilets". Elsewhere, two pages were devoted to the saga of Yorke's future, as the paper hedged its bets with a spread which had "Yorke still a United target" opposite "Yorke stays with Villa".
A few more goals and old Noel could be on the road to nowhere by Christmas. Already they are talking of naming a new national sports facility the Dwight Yorke stadium. "I'd be honoured and flattered," says the man who, at a time of declining behavioural standards, presents the alternative, smiling face of football.
