Penalties in the Rain
A Champions League Final on the Other Side of the World
Penalties in the Rain
It would be easy for me to sit and write a blog post on the Champions League final all about Istanbul in 2005 or Madrid in 2019 (both of which occurred during interesting periods in my life as well) but I also feel that would be far too obvious, although at least one of them will be referenced at some point. The purpose of this blog in the first place was to write about sporting moments and make reference to why they are remembered based around events in life. How these things stick in our brains and become inextricably linked. Not to just be a blog about Liverpool FC. Therefore, the main part of the blog I will write today actually involves two of Liverpool’s greatest rivals during my lifetime - Manchester United vs Chelsea in the Champions League Final of 2008.
You may ask why this is the final that I would choose to write about considering it wasn’t the most exhilarating of affairs or remembered for a wonderful goal or individual piece of skill, although, it was the first ever final contested by two English teams, and only the third to be contested between two teams from the same country. However, this is not why it sticks in my mind. The reason that this final resonates with me still is because it was the one that occurred during my year of travelling after university. This final I watched at 4am in the Ritz for Backpackers Hostel in Melbourne, Australia.
My sister, Emily, and I had departed on our travels on October 17th 2007 with a plan to follow one of the more usual traveller routes through South East Asia, before moving on to Australia then New Zealand and finally the USA. Up until this point (May 2008), we had pretty much stuck to schedule and, despite the time difference meaning games were often on a ridiculous times in the morning, I had still managed to indulge in my footballing passion, whether that be in a hostel common room, on a big screen in a nightclub with people dancing all around, in a family pub run by Brummies in a very jungle type setting in Malaysia, or in a bar in Kho Phi Phi, Thailand with Muay Thai fighters having a kickboxing bout in the middle of the room (all wonderful experiences in their own way). I would actually say that one of the major reasons I never even considered staying abroad like so many travellers (including Emily eventually) do is that it would mean not being able to access football and so many other sports that I love, unless it was in the middle of the night. I couldn’t programme my body to do it regularly enough to satiate my appetite and I wouldn’t be able to avoid results long enough to watch it later, the lure would be too great.
We had arrived in Australia in November, landing in the West Coast in Perth, but our (well mostly my) plan was to be in Melbourne by Christmas, as I wanted to attend the Boxing Day Test Match at the MCG, soon after followed by the Australian Open tennis tournament. Melbourne is a haven for many things (food, music and art included) but it is also a tremendous sporting city, which is why it captured my attention.
After enjoying Perth and taking a trip down the West Coast, which included almost getting stuck up a mountain in the middle of a National Park with no one else around and then our car breaking down a day later, we took a short flight to Adelaide. There we enjoyed the market and the botanic gardens, as well as taking in Ricky Hatton fighting Floyd Mayweather at the casino (after having to go back to the hostel to change into trainers as ‘thongs aren’t allowed mate’). Incidentally, boxing is one sport that it is actually more pleasant to watch in Australia as the time difference between there and the US means that most bouts are on in the morning or early afternoon. Anyway, from there we had a wonderful trip along the south coast, taking in some caving and the incredibly scenic Great Ocean Road, and made some wonderful new friends before arriving in Melbourne a week or so before Christmas.
Initially we decided to base ourselves in the city centre as we planned to stay in Melbourne for a while to work and we figured there would be most chance in the busiest area. It was also in close propensity to the sporting venues. I enjoyed my time in the city (the market, the bars and restaurants and the waterside area were great) and the cricket and tennis were fantastic experiences, but something didn’t really click for me there and I was really struggling to find work. It was then that we made a decision to move to the nearby seaside area of St Kilda which seemed far more relaxed and more of a backpacker haven rather than the hustle and bustle of the centre. With its lovely beach, long pier, the famous Luna Park theme park (very surreal/spooky giant clown face surrounding the entrance) and close propensity to Albert Park, I almost instantly felt more laid back. As often happens, when you relax more yourself, things seem to come a little easier in life in general, and I soon found myself a job, working for an electricity company. The less said about this the better though as I absolutely hated it. Days were effectively spent being dropped off on a random housing estate in the middle of nowhere and wandering door to door in the blazing sunshine asking people if they wanted to change over their electricity provider. People weren’t keen to do this on the spot anyway, let alone with a pasty Scotsman who they struggled to understand. The wages were awful as most money was based on commission (lovely if you actually make some sales!), the hours were ridiculous which meant I had no time at all for socialising and the only positive whatsoever was that very occasionally people took pity and invited me into their home for a cold beer. Suffice to say, I didn’t last very long.
Throughout this period, the upside was that the hostel that we had chosen to stay in seemed great with lots going on and plenty of opportunities to socialise (just not for me at that time as I was out and about trying to get old ladies to understand that what I was doing chapping on their doors). The Ritz for Backpackers was situated towards the top of the strip leading down into central St Kilda, right across from Albert Park and directly above the Elephant and Wheelbarrow pub where the incredibly popular Neighbours night was hosted weekly. Every Monday night we were blessed by the dulcet tones of Karl Kennedy (Alan Fletcher) singing Ruby by the Kaiser Chiefs while 100 or so pissed up backpackers chanted along with him. Lovely! In all seriousness though, it was a great place to be and leaving my job turned out to be the best thing that I ever did as it meant that I got to actually spend more time around the hostel and make friends with other travellers.
Each week seemed to have a set routine of backpacker offers, themed events (terrible shirt night, race night…), lazy days and nights out in different venues, lots of goon (boxed wine) and cheese and plenty of Passion Pop (classy). I still managed to pick up some work along the way - sales, call centres, building sites, whoever would take me, and the months passed easily. I made some amazing friends, many of whom I still have contact with now.
One of these friends was Chris (Coach) who was travelling with his friend John (Gilly). Coach was a big Manchester United fan so we instantly had some banter in our growing friendship, winding each other up about the performance of our respective teams. Whilst we couldn’t watch all matches, we had been following what was going on in the Premier League and particularly the Champions League that year. Three of the English teams had made it through to the semi-finals, Liverpool (who had beaten Arsenal over two legs in a classic encounter), Man U (who had breezed past Roma), and Chelsea (who had made things tough for themselves against the Turkish team Fenerbache).
For the semi-finals, United had a tough tie against Barcelona and Liverpool were drawn against regular European rivals Chelsea. The Blues were desperate to win after being put out at the same stage in both 2005 and 2007 by Liverpool and eventually battled their way through another incredibly close encounter, 4-3 after extra time, Drogba and Lampard scoring in the extra period before Ryan Babel gave the Reds fans some small, but in the end futile, hope at the end.
United battled to a 0-0 draw at the Nou Camp and an early Paul Scholes goal in the second leg at Old Trafford was enough for them to cling onto.
Coach was obviously rather pleased with these results, obviously for the fact that United had gone through, but also for the fact that Liverpool hadn’t.
In those days the final was still on a Wednesday evening as opposed to the Saturday like it is now which was a bit of a pain with it being on in the middle of night as people had work the next day (even I had a regular call centre gig at this point). Regardless, we were all going to stay up to watch the match so went on the usual Wednesday discount backpackers night before coming back to the hostel and gathering in the TV room. There weren’t loads of us but everyone was excited for the match.
To be honest, the game itself didn’t really seem that memorable to me - being incredibly tired and having had a few pints could have had something to do with this. The first half was fine, with Cristiano Ronaldo being inexplicably being left alone at the back post to head United into the lead before Chelsea’s talisman Frank Lampard equalised, against the run of play, on the stroke of half time after the ball had ping-ponged around in the United box. Things got very cagey in the second half and through extra time although Chelsea did hit the post and the bar and Didier Drogba ended up getting himself sent off following a spat with Nemanja Vidic.
What really sticks out about the match the is the penalty shoot out, in near monsoon conditions, late into the Moscow (where the match was being played) evening. The conditions would actually have a huge part to play in the outcome too. Both teams casually converted their first two penalties before Cristiano Ronaldo stepped up to take United’s third. With the form he had been playing in, you would have put your house on him scoring, but he didn’t, putting the ball to the keeper’s right but nowhere near enough to the corner, leading to a simple save. Chelsea kept the pressure on by converting their next two penalties but United followed suit which left it down to the Chelsea captain, John Terry, to take the deciding penalty. If he scored, Chelsea would lift the trophy. By now, the rain was coming down in what seemed like solid sheets and although Terry sent Edwin Van Der Sar in goal the wrong way, when he came to make impact with the ball, he slipped and his penalty went too far right, clattering back off the post. He was clearly devastated, sitting with his head in his hands, and the shootout continued into sudden death. The first three takers held their nerve but then Nicolas Anelka stepped up for Chelsea and, like Ronaldo before him, put his kick too close to the keeper. United had won, Coach was incredibly happy and I even managed to get about an hour’s sleep in before having to get up again to go to work.
I left Melbourne not long after, but Coach and I teamed up again soon to do some more travelling in Fiji and the USA. We continued to rib each other about the fortunes of our teams over the years on occasion too.
I realise that there hasn’t been a huge amount of sport in today’s blog, so before I go, I will give a quick rundown of my own personal favourite Champions League finals with brief reasons why.
2002 Real Madrid 2 Bayer Leverkusen 1
The match was played in Scotland at Hampden Park and Zinedine Zidane scored an absolute cracker. Enough said.
1994 AC Milan 4 Barcelona 0
The first one I remember watching. Barca were nowhere near the force they would later become and Milan we still at their peak but even still no one could have predicted this score line at the start. A sublime performance.
1999 Manchester United 2 Bayern Munich 1
United looked down and out as they were 1-0 down and into injury time at the end of the game but first Sheringham and then Solskjaer managed to bundle home in quick succession to create an incredible comeback. One of the greatest ever. I hate to admit that even I cheered them on after getting caught up in the excitement.
1997 Borussia Dortmund 3 Juventus 1
Regular readers will know that I love an underdog tale and nobody really expected Dortmund to beat a Juventus team who had completely dominated their group before easily winning their knockout ties en route to the final. Two Karl-Heinz Riedle first half goals got them off to a great start before Lars Ricken put the icing on the the cake with an audacious lob of Angelo Peruzzi from 20 yards out. Brilliant.
2005 Liverpool 3 AC Milan 3 (Liverpool win 3-2 on penalties)
Did you seriously ever think it would be anything other than Istanbul? Watching in a pub in Glasgow with all my student friends, 3-0 down at half time, head in hands, I almost left the pub (others did). I said to myself I would give it the first 15 minutes of the second half and see how we went. Thank goodness I did! What followed was the greatest comeback ever. Absolute scenes after goals from Gerrard, Smicer and Alonso before Dudek produced the greatest reaction save I have ever seen and then channeled his inner Grobelaar in the shootout. It will live with me forever. Absolutely incredible.
Whatever happens in tonight’s match between Madrid and Dortmund, there will be plenty of people around the world for whom it will be an incredibly memorable affair.
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