Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide…
Marcos Alonso to Chelsea. £23m from Fiorentina. Despite the weighty transfer fee, it was hardly the most earth-shattering story of the summer transfer window. Not on the same day as Moussa Sissoko was ignoring Ronald Koeman’s phonecalls.
The former Sunderland and Bolton Wanderers player isn’t exactly a high-profile name on these shores (despite his undoubted potential), and it’s not even as if the Blues faced much competition from other clubs for his costly signature.
But there is a very particular aspect of his last minute unveiling that has got us both questioning not only our own eyes, but the very parameters of our known reality. In fact it could easily turn out to be glitch-in-the-matrix shit.
It’s this image of Alonso proudly modelling his shiny new Stamford Bridge uniform. On first inspection it looks perfectly standard as far as announcement photos go. In fact it’s a perfect example of how to present a new signing at your club.
Proud to be a new @ChelseaFC player! Can't wait to start this new adventure! pic.twitter.com/pXPHGuMwtY
— Marcos Alonso (@marcosalonso03) August 31, 2016
But that’s the problem – on closer inspection, it’s all rather too perfect. In fact it’s such a weirdly uniform and pixel-perfect image that, to our eyes at least, it looks more computer-generated than actual real life…
Look at the arms, the hair, the skin-tone, the dead-eyed stare – it’s like a regen image from a computer game – and possibly a slightly dated one at that. One that hasn’t yet perfected the subtle imperfections of living, breathing reality.
I genuinely don't know the answer so apologies if it's a stupid question but is that real life or computer graphics? https://t.co/L7YYIkudbY
— Nooruddean (@BeardedGenius) August 31, 2016
We were confused enough to put it to our readers, and well, they seemed to agree that it looked very peculiar indeed. In fact, like us, they couldn’t work out whether it was a pixellated fabrication or just a real-life photo…
https://twitter.com/RidwanBakshi/status/771081797044232193
https://twitter.com/d1g2w3/status/771242807235182596
@marcosalonso03 @ChelseaFC actually a good question.
Extremely difficult to tell— Mesh (@simplymesh27) August 31, 2016
https://twitter.com/Chrisjameson9/status/771081931970740224
@marcosalonso03 @ChelseaFC I genuinely don't know
— Nick Chainey 💙 (@NLFG) August 31, 2016
My first thought is that he looks like a Football Manager regen in this photo
— Matthew Buzzi (@MJBuzzi) August 31, 2016
@marcosalonso03 @ChelseaFC I think the shirt's been 'adjusted'
Deep in uncanny valley though— Seankdla (@SeanKDLA) August 31, 2016
https://twitter.com/WhartoJohn/status/771082435350134784
https://twitter.com/fwayz/status/771082807548506114
@marcosalonso03 @ChelseaFC its fifa 17
— Jono (@Jonocardoso) August 31, 2016
One person who responded, shared another image from another angle, which he cited as proof that the picture was real. But the slightly disconcerting fact remained that Alonso looked fake in that ‘photo’ too. Nice try, Ben (if that’s your real name)…
@marcosalonso03 @ChelseaFC It's real. All our signings have photos done there. pic.twitter.com/fJVMRCwCQ9
— Ben Page (@PageB95) August 31, 2016
Now let us consider the possibilities: the photo is either real and just happens to look a bit weird; the image is fake and computer-generated, and Chelsea made up the whole thing; OR, both most worryingly and likely of all, Marcos Alonso has escaped from a computer game via some type portal and now an actual regen walks amongst us.
May the Lord have mercy on all our souls.
