Red Dawn

Greetings, gentle readers.
What more can be said about the awesome Anfield spectacle of the European Champions' Cup Semi-Final against Chelski? The print media have gone berzerk in their efforts to fall over one another in an effort to clamber onto the Liverpool bandwagon. Here are some of the press clippings:

"The people's club, clad in red, have shattered the biggest, blue-blooded ambitions of the most wealthy power-broker the game has ever known. They did it in an epic, defiant way too. Truly, there has not been a racket like it since, well, since Liverpool last won a European Cup semi-final on one of these white-lit spring nights or since they closed the old, standing-room only Spion Kop end of Anfield in 1994. It was not just a wall of bulging, stretching, moving red shirts upon which Chelsea had to mount a long, fruitless and toothless assault here. It was a wall of noise too.
- John Dillon, Daily Express

The scenes at the end were incredible. Gerrard was last off the pitch having gone to all four sides in ecstatic celebration. For this particular observer, Anfield will always remain special having been generously clapped off the pitch when Arsenal won the title here in 1989. Not as special, mind, as for the boy from Huyton. How can he say goodbye now to his umbilical cord? Of all Liverpool's momentous results down the years, this one could prove one of the most crucial.
- Alan Smith, Daily Telegraph

It was a conflict rarely witnessed in the annals of sports. A clear-cut, zoroastrian struggle between the forces of light and darkness, good and evil, prudent and profligate, dignified and arrogant, patient and impetuous, traditional and iconoclastic, loyal and mercenary. It was a victory for the ages, when the voice of the people was heard, and the shouts of the children rang through the halls of power and shook the thrones of the rich and imperious. Roman Abramovich may be able to splash out three hundred milion pounds on players (and a manager) from around Europe, but he cannot buy the kind of deep-rooted, nigh-genetic loyalty that caused the Kop to ring out with lusty voice last Tuesday night. Chelski's crew of millionaires wilted in the glare of that red dawn as twenty years of patient tooth-grinding tolerance exploded into the realisation that dreams can come true and that future histories can record the moment local boys become legends. For too long have Scousers graciously borne the gloating, grinning jibes of Arsenal and Manchester United supporters with newly-minted allegiances. This was a time for heroes. And they strode onto that hallowed Anfield turf to a tinnitus-inducing thunderous ovation.
To segue for a moment, I'll try and explain this phenomenon to the North American contingent of my readership, miniscule though that number might be. Imagine if you will, the Edmonton Oilers. In the 1980's, they were a tremendous team. Arguably the greatest pro hockey team to have ever graced the frozen water. The roster of that squad are practically unanimously accepted to be Hall of Fame-bound, if they aren't there already. Their names are mentioned in hushed tones amongst the ice hockey cognoscenti - Gretzky, Kurri, Coffey, Anderson, Messier, Fuhr. Flash-forward to the present, where the Oilers are scrambling frantically every season to make the playoffs.
Now imagine that an Original Six team that has been around for years and never done jack squat in living memory - like the Chicago Blackhawks - is suddenly acquired by someone of the financial stature of Bill Gates, and they consequently splash out (and I do not exaggerate) a half-BILLION dollars to buy the best players from everyone in the league. Then they get a tremendously competent coach, who obnoxiously abuses the rules, the referees and the officials . The next season, they stomp everyone flat, setting a league record for most points in a season en route to their President's Trophy.
Now considering the current labour dispute which has caused professional hockey in North America to take a hiatus, not many neutral observers would be very impressed with such largesse, but the sale of Chicago Blackhawks merchandise would still increase significantly. Oilers fans would be asked to tolerate the taunts and jeers of the fans of the new juggernauts, and endure the spurious comparisons between the glory-days of their team and the accomplishments of the fabulously wealthy champions.
Then, much to the surprise of those who had heralded an end to the days of small-market teams having an ability to compete financially in the league, the Oilers blaze through the playoffs and meet Chicago in the Western Conference Final. (O, where has the Campbell Conference gone?) They then promptly knock the rich lads on their collective tuckus, sweeping them and not conceding a goal. The jubilation and delirium would be immense, and Jasper and Whyte Avenues would be seas of celebration.
So there's some perspective for you.
But back to the footy. After seeing Anfield ablaze in Liverpool red, one is tempted to consider other teams and venues in the greatest club championship in the world. There are the morons in Rome, whose patent idiocy led to the games being played against Leverkusen and Madrid at the Stadio Olimpico to be held behind closed doors. Now there's atmosphere for you. But there really is no excuse for the enormous Stadio Della Alpi sitting silent and empty, with less than seven thousand fans as Juventus played host to Ajax of Amsterdam. Sure, it's not the same Ajax team that won the Champion's Cup three times on the trot in the seventies, but what kind of fair-weather, glory houding mercenary of a fan would ignore his team when they are fighting for a place amongst the elite of the continent? Italian fans have given themselves a couple of black eyes in terms of their reputations around Europe already with the hooliganism, violence, and general stupidity, but now they have to contend with the perception that any Latin passion they once nurtured has everything to do with stabbing and beating each other, and nothing at all to do with The Beautiful Game. With a team of a pedigree as glorious as Juventus, one would expect something other than dispassionate indifference.
And so, I'm not missing the final on the 25th, come Hell or high water. I will quit my job (s) if need be, but this is what my distant relative Immanuel Kant would call a categorical imperative. What sort of misbegotten hypocrite would I be if I were to slang off all but a tiny minority of Italian footy fans and then display the same appalling lack of conviction?
And now, I must needs bid a fond textual adieu to all and sundry as I prepare to go down the pub and watch the penultimate game of the season, as Liverpool travel to Highbury to try and demolish the confused and oddly dispirited Gunners, whose form this year has been almost laughably disparate from their season last year, when they didn't lose a single game in the Premiership. What I hope transpires is that Thierry Henry misses out on the game due to a lack of match-fitness, Liverpool blitzkrieg them into submission, but they recover in time for their next match and clobber Everton. After all, Arsene Wenger has said that he will use playing form as his guide to selections in terms of the team he will field in the FA Cup final on the 21st, and Everton are opponents in close proximity to that date...
And so, good night England and the colonies. Cheerio.

-mARKUS

^+ Justice for the 96+^