Super Bowl LV: Tom Brady delivers one for the ages

Tom Brady’s answers to the G.O.A.T debate? Some like steak, chicken or pizza. In Super Bowl LV he delivered the whole damn meal.

Tom Brady Tampa Bay Buccaneers celebrates with his daughter Vivian at Raymond James Stadium Picture: Getty Images

Before Tom Brady won his seventh Super Bowl to confirm himself the finest American footballer in history by the length of Route 66, and one of the most extraordinary athletes the world has ever seen. The old bloke was asked about the G.O.A.T debate. The question of whom may be The Greatest Of All Time.

The 43-year-old Brady um’d and ah’d and said: “Everyone has different tastes for different things.

“If I say, what’s your favourite meal, some people like steak. Some people like chicken. I don’t know, some people like pizza. That’s athletes. You know what I mean? It depends what style you like.

“I just want to go out there and play a great game.”

Kayo is your ticket to the best sport streaming Live & On-Demand. New to Kayo? Get your 14-day free trial & start streaming instantly >

Brady played a game so great his underdog Tampa Bay Buccaneers annihilated the Kansas City Chiefs 31-9 in Super Bowl LV. No words on this page could do justice to the perfect shock of it. Brady schooled the Chiefs’ 25-year-old superstar quarterback Patrick Mahomes to claim an unrivalled seventh Superbowl ring.

We thought his story had already been written, an epic tale it was, but on Monday he scribbled another chapter. It was true sporting greatness. The steak, the chicken and the pizza. The whole damn meal.

The old bloke ruled. Forty-three looked the new 34. His first six Super Bowl triumphs came at the powerhouse New England Patriots. To go to struggling Tampa and repeat the feat was thought impossible.

The devastated Mahomes said: “When you’re an athlete, you chase greatness. Tom Brady is the pinnacle of that.”

Brady’s bunch of titles at the Patriots paled by comparison to this. He roared to the firework-lit sky. Hands went to his head. Nearly too good to be true.

Raymond James Stadium had 25,000 humans and 40,000 cardboard cutouts in attendance. Even the latter seemed to jump to their cardboard feet and salute him. “I’m happy,” Brady said before going through a familiar routine. The routine of lifting the Vince Lombardi Trophy and accepting the MVP award.

Tom Brady steered the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to an upset Super Bowl victory Picture: Getty Images

No hair was out of place. Not a drop of sweat. He looked every inch an all-American hero.

“How about that! I’m so proud of all of these guys,” he said while pointing at his teammates. “I think we knew this was going to happen, didn’t we? I’m not making any comparisons. This team … world champions forever. You can’t take it away from us.”

Asked if he would play again next season, he grinned: “We’re coming back.”

Superbowl LV was quite the production. The deep silence for COVID-19 victims. The electric-guitar rendition of America The Beautiful that made America sound beautiful again.

The toss of the coin by an ICU nurse from Tampa. Any greater heroes in the last year than ICU nurses? Probably not.

A singer called The Weeknd did the famed halftime show. Verdict? Hardly JLo and Shakira. Not even a wardrobe malfunction to get excited about. I’d never heard of him and I’d be happy to not hear him again. There’s more missing than the “e”.

He spent nine million of his own dollars to make his set a winner. He’d want his money back. As would the crowd, both humans and cardboard.

Brady was the real show. The real entertainment. Feted like an ICU nurse. He fended off Father Time while a father himself. His kids were in the grandstand, then in his arms.

“I always tell my children, this is what dads do,” Brady said. “We go to work. We’ve got to show up and we’ve got to find something we love to do. If you find something you love, you’re going to work hard and you’re going to be good at it.

“And if you’re good at it, you’re going to enjoy it. In the off-season I’ve ready made a concerted effort, certainly in the last three or four years, to spend more quality time with them.

“My kids are getting older. It’s not always about what’s going on in dad’s life. It’s about what going on in their life too. Part of being an older athlete – that’s the tricker part. How do you find time and balance a lot of things that are important to the other people in your life?”