Graphic: City slickers: how Mark Hughes could buy a team of class acts for the price of one Brazilian

Alan Shearer was labelled “boring” a decade ago because he had no flamboyant personality off the pitch, no documented vices, no funky look or haircut and never said anything controversial. Oh, and he creosoted his garden fence on the day Blackburn Rovers won the Premier League in 1995. Which may explain why Freddy Shepherd, the former Newcastle United chairman, called his No 9 “Mary Poppins”.

One may be tempted to say the same about Ricardo Izecson dos Santos Leite, aka Kaká. He does not drink or smoke, his haircut looks like something out of the 1970s, he is polite and courteous to a fault. And he preserved his virginity up to his wedding day, which, for a footballer, is about as wacky as working in the garden rather than celebrating winning the title.

Shearer and Kaká may be dull from a celebrity perspective, but stick them on a football pitch and watch magic happen. It is not the kind of sorcery born of flashy moves and baroque touches. It is the most special — and useful — magic, skill distilled to its most essential elements. Nothing is wasted, everything has a purpose.

Hughes must stand up and stop Kaka bid

Manager must know it is not yet time to bid for the Brazilian and that such a high-profile new arrival will only add to club's woes

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• Media call Kaka bid ‘madness’ and ‘unrefusable’

BACKGROUND

• Kaka: superstar with vision but no vices

• Italian media aghast at City's Kaka offer

• Analysis: Oliver Kay

• Man City launch £91m Kaka bid

Multimedia

• Debate: is the Kaka bid marvellous or madness?

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BACKGROUND

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Related Links

• Analysis: Oliver Kay

• Man City launch £91m Kaka bid

They are very different players in style and position, but the common thread is simplicity; making something difficult look easy in the most direct way possible. That was Shearer. And that is Kaká.

When I spent some time with the Brazil forward two summers ago, he pretended to bristle at the “boring” tag. He insisted he was quite the opposite. “I am a radical,” he said. “In fact, I’m very radical. I have my life, I have my values. And, compared to much of society, especially football, that is radical.”

Kaká, a devout evangelical Christian, sticks to his faith in a secular world. And that, he says, is what makes him a radical, a non- conformist, a man who walks in his own religious bubble, respecting the choices of others but keeping them at arm’s length. “I isolate myself from such things,” he said. “And people still accept me.

“As for others, I respect them and their right to choose to do other things. I don’t judge them. If you can do that, it’s not hard to be a Christian in a less than Christian world.”

You probably have to go back to Muhammad Ali to find the last global superstar who was so up front and devout in matters of faith, but Kaká’s belief is perhaps not that surprising when you consider what he endured.

He was born with severe myopia and a rare bone deficiency that stunted his growth. At the age of 16 he cracked a vertebra at the top of his spine in a fall from a water-slide. The doctors told him that 99 per cent of such cases end in paralysis; but the vertebra healed perfectly (and mysteriously) on its own and, within two years, he was making his debut for Brazil.

Beyond that, it is not difficult to imagine him excelling in the Barclays Premier League, just as he has done elsewhere. Technically, he is a rare blend of South America and Europe: the flair and creativity of the former, the directness and tactical nous of the latter. That cocktail allowed him to integrate seamlessly into AC Milan from the moment he signed in 2003, avoiding the lengthy adaptation period that other South American stars, from Ronaldinho to Robinho, endured upon arriving in Europe.

“I knew that I had to adapt to European football,” he said. “I am just one man, I knew it wasn’t going to adapt to me. At the same time, I knew that if they signed me it was because I could provide something different. And I knew I had to maintain that.”

That ability to adapt, to adjust his arsenal of skills, distilling those elements that best suit his environment, is perhaps his single greatest asset. And if he lands in the Premier League, it will serve him well.