Question one. What happened to George Best's original liver? asks Kevin Myers
Was it sent for testing to Los Alamos, where it interbred with a nuclear isotope and is now planning to take over the world? Or did it retire to Torquay to open a small bistro, specialising in sea-food, fine wines and group sex? It is qualified to do all these things - though I fear it might be doing none of them, and instead has been unceremoniously disposed of, thus depriving mankind of a bottomless source of wisdom.
Question two. What about the second liver, the one George Best is currently laying siege to, like the Nazis did to Sevastopol? Did another person on the same waiting-list die because George Best got that liver, and none other was suitable in time? Or was great damage done to the health of a patient on the list, one whose illness was not self-inflicted? And how gratifying to know that George Best might well be the custodian of a liver which could have kept a far better, more deserving person alive.
Question three. How does George Best pay for this extraordinary life that he leads? He has not had a meaningful income in decades. To be sure, a new "autobiography" comes out every five years or so, but even the most enthusiastic Bestophiles must weary of the same self-congratulatory "Ach, George, where did it all go wrong?" stories, repeated for decade after decade, because they're mostly speculative. Only the first liver knows the truth, and he's not talking.
Question four. Has George Best done anything for anyone else in his entire life? Has he ever had a selfless thought? Has he made a personal sacrifice for another's benefit? Or has his entire life been an unbroken essay in personal self-indulgence, in which he has been unable to conjugate a single vowel beyond the first personal singular? We all know he was a sublimely gifted footballer: but that doesn't make him a great one. The word "great" has a moral dimension; and the only sentence in which you can put George Best and moral dimension is of the kind in which you can link white whales and interplanetary travel. Muhammad Ali was willing to sacrifice his career out of his opposition to the Vietnam war.
Eusebio used to applaud goalkeepers who had saved his best shots. Cruyff was the intellectual and moral engine for "total football". Pele was the world's greatest team athlete of any sport in the entire 20th century.
Best never had it within his ethical compass to be any of these men. He was a moral dwarf, and his littleness was made the more apparent by his footballing genius, unlike any I have ever seen. Much of his brilliance is lost for ever, because so few football matches were televised when he was at his peak. I saw one which is forever engraved on the memories of those privileged to be there. No footage of it exists.
Manchester United were playing Leicester City away, when Leicester was perhaps the second or third best team in England. Best was injured quite early on in the game, and in those days, no substitutes were allowed.
Unable to play as striker, he dropped back into midfield. That day, Leicester played superbly: they could have beaten any other team in the first division. They lost 5-0, and George Best was the reason.
His performance was godlike. He stood in the centre of the park, and from early on, Manchester United realised their he was their ace. He barely tackled, merely passed the ball, but his distribution was uncanny, almost possessed. Soon he bound all the United players in a single hive-mind empathy: his brain reached into theirs, transforming all 11 United players into footballing geniuses. Openings suddenly appeared in the middle of a rock-solid defence. Players would start insane runs, yet would be rewarded with the ball landing on their toes, and attaching itself to their laces. It was von Karajan raising his baton before a fine orchestra and lifting it up to the very heavens.
George Best stood that day on the verge of truly monumental career greatness, which would assuredly have been his with a modicum of discipline and selflessness; he chose the other route and, grotesquely, has been the object of adoration ever since. He is for ever on the television circuit, and no doubt all over these islands, chat-show producers are rubbing their hands with glee and chortling at the prospect of him appearing on air yet again.
His defenders have even portrayed him as a victim because of his modest Belfast background, when countless other greater athletes - Pele, Eusebio, Cassius Clay - emerged from infinitely greater deprivation.
Alcohol certainly wasn't the reason why he gave up serious football before the age of 24. He was the reason. He totally lacked application.
He cared for nothing, was feckless and unreliable, the man who, when you needed him most, would always let you down.
But he had - has - charm. Charm is a curse that protects its possessors from the hard lessons of life. It beds women, begets celebrity and bemuses the censorious. The truly charmed need learn no lessons, make no concessions and conciliate no one, for the rest of the world will inevitably move to accommodate them. George Best has done nothing for anyone in his entire life, yet the reward for his enduring selfishness is popular acclaim, and, of course, utter failure. But beware charm: for by that cursed blessing did Lucifer fall.