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Balon. Meta. All you need to know. |
We have come in our thousands to stand before yet another
high altar of world football. We throng the tree-lined precincts of the Ramblas
and Plaza Real with its gothic arches and extravagant Gaudi lamp posts. We
cluster in expectant groups and drink in the sights, drink in the Volldam, the
Cruzcampo, the Estreladam, drink in the wonderful warm sunlight. Cans litter
the pavements where petals once fell. An Estreladam lorry trundles gently up
the middle of the square just in case of emergencies. Plastic beach balls are
kicked in to the majestic palm trees and flags announce our arrival from every pillar
and post. Cafés disgorge aromas of freshly fried squid and great thighs of
Serrano ham hang enticingly from every beam. We line their streets in our sweat
stained polyester leisurewear where a thousand and one wool-clad hipsters have
stalked moodily in their Pedro del Horno button downs. We fill their well-heeled
alleys and terraces with the confident calls of Gorton and Collyhurst,
Prestwich and Bury where the guttural shouts of Catalan and normally resonate.
We drape little corners of this red and yellow striped city with the sky blue
favours and prepare our gallows humour for the inevitable disappointment. A
pasting? An embarrassment? A let-down? A near miss or a hard luck story? Few
and far between are the voices expressing certainty of a two goal win and those
that whisper it also slur it.
Where some decide it is warm enough to have a swim in the
hotel’s roof pool (a rectangle of icy water, seven feet by nine feet briefly
houses three grown men who should have known quite a lot better. The icy
surface is only broken by several ill-timed and haphazardly constructed
bellyflops), the rest of us make do with sunglasses and a read of the paper in
the gentle spring temperatures of a city coming quickly into bloom.
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Gaudi's lamp posts: droopy |
Expectations get the better of us amongst the heaving mass
of humanity edging its way up the Diagonal
to the stadium. We, the scruffy mongrels, filled up on chick peas and pork and Catalan
creme brulée are on our unsteady way to the Nou Camp for another kind of feast.
Outside the giant cliff face of Barcelona’s mythical home,
quite a scene is developing as nearly 87,000 people make a concerted effort to
gain entry to the same building. The ticket that has been in and out of my pocket
all day, just to make sure it hasn’t melted or departed through a new method of
osmosis through my pocket and out into the atmosphere, states somewhat
precisely General 3 Graderia, Acces 19, Boca 533, Fila 0027, sient 0016.
Even with a slow to stationary grasp of Catalan, I am onto it. Happily it also
states “only for the visiting supporters”,
which makes one feel kind of special.
Just how special Barcelona find us is to be revealed once we
have climbed to the top of the mountain.
Do Michel Platini and his band of besuited canapé
crunchers, being feted, wined and dined somewhere in the bowels of this
cavernous stadium, know how far some of us have had to walk to get to our sients? And all uphill at that! Images
of his face come to me, munching languidly on some thinly sliced salmon
marinated in the juices of a million cadis fly larvae, as we haul our miserable
corpses ever upwards. Only the secure knowledge that we are about to witness
one of the crowning moments in City’s history drives us ever onward into the
mists of a darkening Catalan night.
The Travessa de Les Corts, once jam packed with taxis,
tooting cars and impatient pedestrians, all converging on the citadel, by now lies
miles below us, its traffic thinning, its population emptying into the big
building with the tall sides. The last flight of stairs becomes onerous and slow, as lungs
fail and a queue forms to get back out into the open air. A steward appears,
jolly of face, dapper of bib, to wave us on. “Go, vale, vale!” he shouts and
gestures that it would be wise if we continue to climb to a section that
appears to be full already. All those little numbers printed carefully onto our
tickets suddenly mean nothing. Nothing at all. It is like boarding the late
Ryanair from Magaluf, but with 5,500 other happy souls who have been at the
trolley service all day.
Our sometimes jovial, sometimes serious, but mostly
tremendously apprehensive steward, silently
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From behind the nets "ripped by City fans" |
mouthing entreaties to the Gods of
the Sagrada Familia who have placed him here tonight as Barcelona’s sole
representative before a rabble of English that will almost certainly riot at
the drop of a hat, has bought into the theory that most of us have arrived unwashed
and unreconstructed on a charter flight direct from 1983. Looking at us, you
can see the area for confusion.
Possessing only Catalan, Spanish and a rudimentary ability
to wave his arms, he tells late arrivals to keep on going. We are facing the heavens.
We are just under the clouds. There are no allocated seats. My Boca 533 is correct
enough, but the rest is as rooted in reality as Monsieur Lannoy’s grasp of a
good tackle is about to be. People are just being waved forward and upwards
into already packed stands. Bewildered, frightened and in a hurry, the gangways
are filling with fans too. Heated words are exchanged between folk who know no
Spanish and bibbed representatives of Barcelona who know no English.
When we finally manage to turn to face the other way, the
temple reveals itself in glorious technicolour. Only there is a hitch here too.
For, we will be the only fans to be afforded the same view you would have
watching migrating wildebeest from a helicopter, through a thick camouflage tent. Pockets of City fans are beginning to make
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Where the special funds are kept |
themselves heard
further below in the home sections. Three of our happy band –we already know- are
at the other end of the stadium with other optimists, who had bought tickets on
the Ramblas in the morning.
** Note to FC Barcelona: wonder if those in the know might
want to put some of that Neymar leftover fund into shoring up the old edifice a
little and perhaps paying for some English classes for Apprehensive Rùben and
his jittery mates in bibs.
But there is no time for trifles like this. The teams are
entering the surface to a mass of plastic red and yellow flags. The Barcelona
anthem strikes up. It will be days before the dry little military ditty exits
my head. As the sides line up the first swell of Blue Moon heaves out over the
night sky. We are so high up, this probably doesn't even register to the folks
back home, but the tightly packed City curva
is in tremendous voice. The home fans will manage two more flag waving bursts
after each goal and the occasional roll of tickled applause. I am struck by a
lack of passion in the ground. They have seen it all before, I guess. One
Champions League knock-out round morphs seemlessly into another and so on until
the world stops turning.
The next day reasons for this are
revealed. The little red and yellow flags are everywhere. In the old town, at
the cathedral, on the Ramblas, at Plaza Catalunya and each one is neatly rolled
up and poking from the back of a foreign tourist’s rucksack. Here lies the
future and it is wrapped in canvas and speaking Swedish.
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"Is that Messi there...the smallish one?" |
I digress. The action has started. City manager Pellegrini is up in the Gods for talking too much (only the dios know what he will say after this one), whilst Gerardo Martino, embattled and possessing the suave good looks of a bus driver coming off the late shift in Asunción, prowls the touchline alongside the thin fellow who assists our manager. Make no mistake, Barcelona
are far from past it. Tales of their impending demise have been somewhat
exaggerated. Whilst the morning press and its possessed by the Gods headlines are
predictably over the top, there still remains enough class to make this
Barcelona vintage a tough one to uncork. They still swarm at you with their
short passes. They still overwhelm with their quick thinking. They still grind
you into making mistakes in dangerous areas of the pitch. Most importantly,
they still have an innate ability to be knocked from their feet by the slightest
zephyr of breeze and make it look like Hurricane Hadley is in town. Our French
stand-up, Monsieur Tannoy (shout it loud) is convinced and proceeds towards
refereeing nirvana with his golden whistle and his warped sense of fair play.
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Packed at the front, dishevelled at the back |
City, hardly the underdog these days, hold on for dear life.
An increasingly dogged, brave display begins to grow on us. Not cowed, not
pressed back, City are winning corners and keeping possession. Against the
owners of the ball. Chances come and go. Lescott upends Messi but the referee
is busy filing his nails. Joleon’s trusty old legs are whirring as fast as they
can, but every time he slides one in, the little Argentine has just departed. City
go toe to toe and do not give an inch.
Again, as in the first leg, we are treated to a referee seemingly
starstruck and whistling gleefully whenever Barcelona players go to ground (and
boy do they go to ground). At one stage Iniesta lands on the turf, dispatched
by an ordinary enough tackle, and lies in a diagonal mess with one arm stiff
and in the air, like a board hard corpse. Whilst many of the Catalan newspapers and
sections of the English press dismiss City’s efforts as puny, the wall of support
from upon high suggests a different point of view. Referee Tannoy dismisses
Zabaleta for asking for his penalty back. Messi does his famous little feint and dink
routine. All is going round. Kompany digs an equaliser and the brattish Dani
Alves immediately skips in for 2-1. Barça are not dead. Not yet. The press, who
have murdered them all week, now flush up with hyperbole. It is all about dios
and pasión. We have seen great
players play well, but we have seen little or no passion. A place swollen on
history and self-importance, pumped by thousands of tourists and half-believers
does not easily make for pasión. It is already happening at the Etihad. This is the cult
of the super clubs.
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Amadeu arrives at Plaza Real |
City are out of the Champions League, but have acquitted
themselves admirably to what had always seemed a gigantic task.
Now they must lick their wounds and prepare to swap the
sun-kissed Ramblas for the sobering surrounds of Humberside. Wigan-Barcelona-Hull
in the space of a week. Time travelling at its best. Whilst the quality of
opposition will not be nearly as intimidating, those heading to Hull can
at least rest assured their accomodation will be safe and comfortable, their seats
appropriately numbered and their “matchday experience” will mirror the standards
expected of stadia in the 21st century. Michel Platini will not be in Hull on
Saturday, but he will no doubt be fascinated to learn that even the biggest of
European giants can still, it seems, learn some valuable lessons from their smaller
brethren, if what the powers that be have turned into a “consumer experience”
wishes to live up to its lofty and these days not inexpensive tag.
PRESS REACTION -
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"Negative point: Manchester City fans again ripped the netting protecting the away section..." Mundo Deportivo |
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Those That Are Alive (When They Want To Be) "Those that are dead are City." ... "Messi and Andrés assassinated them..." - Sport |
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"Nasri.timid. Lescott. Insufficient. Dzeko. Man of the Match." |
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"Gods return the faith to Nou Camp" - Sport |
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"Impressive support and passion for the team...." - Mundo Deportivo |