...without a friend in sight...
...I'm hangin' on a hook, but I'm alright...
One night in May. Istanbul. European Champions League Final.
Liverpool (my adopted City)
versus
AC Milan
A night no-one in Liverpool will ever forget. May 25th, 2005.
(The original video was taken away from youtube, but I replaced it with this one)
Since I lived in Korea for 5 years, I was lucky enough to experience the month-long World Cup of soccer there in 2002. Those memories will stay with me forever, especially as Korea came 4th.
However, the video below surpasses it all. Liverpool had won this competition 4 times previously, and interest in the UK was high. We set the alarm for 4 am (hence the song - name it anyone?) and waited for the kick-off at 5 am.
Those of you not in the know, "soccer" is called "football" in England. It was called "soccer" because the original name of the sport was "AsSOCiation Football".
Normally, in a game of soccer, you can expect only one or two goals. 3-4 is quite rare. The game below has six.
AC Milan are one of the best Italian teams, and in the first half, they took Liverpool apart like they weren't there. Liverpool 0 AC Milan 3.
Then came the second half. We only got Korean commentary and afterwards, I downloaded the full match with English commentary.
A few minutes after the second half began, Steven Gerrard, Liverpool's captain and mentor, scored a goal to make it 1-3.
The english commentator made a telling comment as the ball went into the net. He said "Ello! Ello! Here we go", a reference to the fact that in all their history, Liverpool Soccer Team "never say die", a point well-made owing to the Team's determination to win despite the odds.
So the commentator was remembering what had happened in previous years when Liverpool had been down, but at 0-3, Was it possible?
The answer came minutes later and the score became 2-3. The Commentator then said "Miracles CAN happen!".
The rest I leave to the video.
At this level, if matches are tied at the end, they play an extra 15 minutes, then, if still level, the two teams are given 5 "free kicks" each, with only the man in goal to beat. These are called penalties.
The team scoring the most goals wins.
Suffice it to say, at 7.30 am we were screaming and jumping around!
One Night. Two Teams. One Trophy. 22 players and six goals. For soccer fans, it was a treat
Thursday, March 27, 2008
I'm wide awake at 4am....
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3 comments:
No disrespect, for I know all the teams play by the same rules, but shouldn't the game be finished with one of the teams besting the other on the field, rather than by penalty kicks? I think I would rather see a reduction of players to smaller teams with an extra overtime or something like that, ending with a tie, if no one scores.
By comparison, this would be like in basketball after playing to a double overtime tie, you give a team 5 chances to make a free throw to win, while allowing the opposing center to stand a few feet in front of the basket to try to block the freethrow shot. I would find it hard to get excited about that, just as I do a penalty shot ending a World Cup Soccer Championship.
Why play the game if so many games are going to come down to penalty shots? It beats me how Soccer can be the most popular sport in the world when played that way. Thanks for letting me sound off. For American audiences anyway, I think changes are needed in the sport to hold our interest.
Having said this, in the 1960s through probably the early 1970s I watched a fair share of soccer on the old ABC Wide World of Sports program. For some reason, I thought there was more scoring back then. I do think the speed of the game is missed on American television, especially since most Americans have not been raised playing the sport, particularly at the world class level.
Sir, this is point long since labored over in England. Everybody hates penalty shoot-outs, ezpecially the English International side, since they seem to lose them all.
The "Golden Goal" was tried in the 1998 World Cup in France, whereby they played up to an extra half hour, the team winning being the team who scores next.
But if the scores were still level, they still had the penalties, and for that reason, it probably was not a success.
Thank you for your kind reply. By the end I felt like a raving lunatic who knew nothing about his subject. I respect those who know the game and am confident they are able to come up with a better solution to this than I can. These are highly skilled athletes whose great efforts end in an anti-climatic fashion. They deserve better. I hope one day soon they receive it.
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