Matt Clark
11 Apr 2007, 10:00 AM
Attention-seeking title, I know. I thought of something like "Behind enemy lines" or similar, but given the scenes I witnessed last night, I couldn't get past the line I finally chose. For yes, I attended the Manchester United v AS Roma match last night.
My Brother-in-Law and his family are up for the Easter holiday and his old best mate from school has a debenture at the Skip. He couldn't make it, so B-i-L arrives home about half six last night and says do I fancy going on up at United? I'm not going to Anfield tonight because of an unfortunately scheduled family event so that was to be my footie fix for the week.
Off we scooted, listening to the build up (and the brickings and bottlings) on the radio along the M56. We both agreed that Roma would be pulling off a bit of an upset if they managed to protect their slender lead for the full 90 at OT (let alone build on it), but like the rest of the world, neither of us foresaw the full awfulness of what was about to be heaped on anyone of a Roman persuasion.
I've been to the Skip on innumerable occasions, for all sorts of reasons and even been to watch United play there rather than going on Liverpool or England business, but I'd never been up in the posh bits. The tickets we had didn't lead to a box, more of a private bar called "Evolution", which in turn led off onto an enclosed set of seats, which seemed primarily distinguished from the ordinary areas by the fact that they had cushions on them. Oh - and twats on the cushions. Although that doesn't really distinguish them that much. The cushions are still the main difference ... :D
We got a bunch of free canape type food and some bubbles - I was amused to note that they do actually serve Prawn sandwiches. We could be charitable and presume this to be an act of self-depricating irony, but there's not a lot about our friends from the "Theatre of Dreams" that convinces you they do self-deprecation. And as to irony ... well. Suffice it to say that United are to irony what Henry Kissinger was to satire.
Anyway, in common with the rest of the corporate slurpers, we took our seats about 5 minutes after kick-off. And kept taking them for the next 90 minutes as every 10 seconds one of our corporate chums would need to sidle past us to go and bray into a mobile phone or empty their clearly overworked bladders or godness knows what else. I hate that so much. And it's not an Old Trafford thing, that, to be fair and honest. There's tons of people like that at Anfield too. ********ing wankers. If you can't sit (or preferably stand) still for 45 minutes at a time without needing a piss, a conversation with your girlfriend or another drink, then don't go to a football match. It's pretty sodding simple.
The first thing we noticed was noise. Singing and stuff. Chanting. We knew then that our projections of Roman doom would prove accurate - you know the footie Gods have put the spin on you if you've managed to get noise out of an Old Trafford crowd. Remember - this was five minutes after kick-off, normally you can hear the litter wardens on the concourse outside bantering with each other by this point in "the Old Trafford experience". And it sustained itself throughout most of the match, too. Unprecedented, as even the most hackneyed of United regulars would admit.
Mind you, with the game on show even that dung-eyed bunch of inbred miseries could be relied on to act like live human beings. I've seen a lot of comments already today about Roma's defending and it's true - they were embarrassingly bad at the back, but still, let's not be churlish. At times, United were unplayable. OK, some of their moves (like, for instance, the one for the second and third goals) wouldn't have been allowed by even the lowliest Premiership side* but still, let's not be carping. United were breathtaking at times. My MOTM was Giggs - the way he played in behind Smith and Rooney, drifting across the width of the pitch both as compliment to them and as compensation for the absence of Scholes was wonderful to observe - and clearly mesmerizing to the Roma defence, who appeared entirely at a loss for what to do about it.
*bet you don't see Watford getting carved up like that on the weekend
Ferguson is often exposed for the tactical blunderbuss he is in Europe, but this time he got his set-up spot on, not just with how he asked Giggs to play but also in selecting Alan Smith ahead of Solskjaer and in how the home side played as though they were a goal down throughout the game. They never let Roma settle, hassling and haranguing them from the outset and destroying any sense of rhythm they might have established. Mind you, I think the Roma coach got things pretty disastrously wrong. Don't know much about the fella, but it seemed to me like he'd sent his team out with conflicting messages. They seemed unsure as to whether to attack or defend, to keep it tight or go for the jugular. Almost as though his last rallying cry to them had been "let's go for it, don't let them settle, get an early goal - but make sure you keep it tight and don't get in over your head, that would be disastrous, we all need to be very careful!". Without wishing to take anything away from United, all three first goals can be directly attributed to this half-hearted approach - in each instance Roma broke down in an attack launched without conviction and then got hammered by a counter defended without vigour. Their coach has to take a lot of the blame. Roma are, after all, Italy's biggest serial chokers and have regularly embarrassed themselves and all fans of Italian football every time they leave the safety of domestic competition - so if you're going to try and get past a Manchester United in the Champions' League, you need to make sure you've got all your ducks in a row before the game.
By half-time, it was all over. B-i-L and I actually stayed in the bar and watched the Chelsea match for the first 20 minutes, missing goals 5 and 6, but returned to see the consolation effort (much ironic cheering from our hosts, much sullen silence from their Italian guests) and the final flourish. When the wits of the Stretford End treated their Ultra friends to a chorus of "Who are ya?", which just goes to prove you don't need to be a Liverpool supporter to witness humourous and original banter at the footie.
Oh hang on - yes you do. But let's not dwell, bless 'em. There was probably headaches and nosebleeds all round the ground with the amount of noise they'd made in the preceding hour and a half. It was almost rowdy. In fact, as we were leaving, a lot of the older fans on the concourse were marvelling at the fact that the atmosphere had been the best they'd seen since 1843, which was sweet.
There were apparently more scuffles outside the ground after the match, although I didn't see any - we had headed off and got ourselves home to the civilised end of the East Lancs Road. It was a thoroughly enjoyable occasion - all the better for being free.
Oh all right then. I'll admit it. I was still disappointed United won. Especially as I have quite a decent hit rate of going to see them lose at theirs. But in the manner they won, well. You just have to take your hat off and say they deserved it. It'll just have to be Milan or Bayern that knocks them out instead.
My Brother-in-Law and his family are up for the Easter holiday and his old best mate from school has a debenture at the Skip. He couldn't make it, so B-i-L arrives home about half six last night and says do I fancy going on up at United? I'm not going to Anfield tonight because of an unfortunately scheduled family event so that was to be my footie fix for the week.
Off we scooted, listening to the build up (and the brickings and bottlings) on the radio along the M56. We both agreed that Roma would be pulling off a bit of an upset if they managed to protect their slender lead for the full 90 at OT (let alone build on it), but like the rest of the world, neither of us foresaw the full awfulness of what was about to be heaped on anyone of a Roman persuasion.
I've been to the Skip on innumerable occasions, for all sorts of reasons and even been to watch United play there rather than going on Liverpool or England business, but I'd never been up in the posh bits. The tickets we had didn't lead to a box, more of a private bar called "Evolution", which in turn led off onto an enclosed set of seats, which seemed primarily distinguished from the ordinary areas by the fact that they had cushions on them. Oh - and twats on the cushions. Although that doesn't really distinguish them that much. The cushions are still the main difference ... :D
We got a bunch of free canape type food and some bubbles - I was amused to note that they do actually serve Prawn sandwiches. We could be charitable and presume this to be an act of self-depricating irony, but there's not a lot about our friends from the "Theatre of Dreams" that convinces you they do self-deprecation. And as to irony ... well. Suffice it to say that United are to irony what Henry Kissinger was to satire.
Anyway, in common with the rest of the corporate slurpers, we took our seats about 5 minutes after kick-off. And kept taking them for the next 90 minutes as every 10 seconds one of our corporate chums would need to sidle past us to go and bray into a mobile phone or empty their clearly overworked bladders or godness knows what else. I hate that so much. And it's not an Old Trafford thing, that, to be fair and honest. There's tons of people like that at Anfield too. ********ing wankers. If you can't sit (or preferably stand) still for 45 minutes at a time without needing a piss, a conversation with your girlfriend or another drink, then don't go to a football match. It's pretty sodding simple.
The first thing we noticed was noise. Singing and stuff. Chanting. We knew then that our projections of Roman doom would prove accurate - you know the footie Gods have put the spin on you if you've managed to get noise out of an Old Trafford crowd. Remember - this was five minutes after kick-off, normally you can hear the litter wardens on the concourse outside bantering with each other by this point in "the Old Trafford experience". And it sustained itself throughout most of the match, too. Unprecedented, as even the most hackneyed of United regulars would admit.
Mind you, with the game on show even that dung-eyed bunch of inbred miseries could be relied on to act like live human beings. I've seen a lot of comments already today about Roma's defending and it's true - they were embarrassingly bad at the back, but still, let's not be churlish. At times, United were unplayable. OK, some of their moves (like, for instance, the one for the second and third goals) wouldn't have been allowed by even the lowliest Premiership side* but still, let's not be carping. United were breathtaking at times. My MOTM was Giggs - the way he played in behind Smith and Rooney, drifting across the width of the pitch both as compliment to them and as compensation for the absence of Scholes was wonderful to observe - and clearly mesmerizing to the Roma defence, who appeared entirely at a loss for what to do about it.
*bet you don't see Watford getting carved up like that on the weekend
Ferguson is often exposed for the tactical blunderbuss he is in Europe, but this time he got his set-up spot on, not just with how he asked Giggs to play but also in selecting Alan Smith ahead of Solskjaer and in how the home side played as though they were a goal down throughout the game. They never let Roma settle, hassling and haranguing them from the outset and destroying any sense of rhythm they might have established. Mind you, I think the Roma coach got things pretty disastrously wrong. Don't know much about the fella, but it seemed to me like he'd sent his team out with conflicting messages. They seemed unsure as to whether to attack or defend, to keep it tight or go for the jugular. Almost as though his last rallying cry to them had been "let's go for it, don't let them settle, get an early goal - but make sure you keep it tight and don't get in over your head, that would be disastrous, we all need to be very careful!". Without wishing to take anything away from United, all three first goals can be directly attributed to this half-hearted approach - in each instance Roma broke down in an attack launched without conviction and then got hammered by a counter defended without vigour. Their coach has to take a lot of the blame. Roma are, after all, Italy's biggest serial chokers and have regularly embarrassed themselves and all fans of Italian football every time they leave the safety of domestic competition - so if you're going to try and get past a Manchester United in the Champions' League, you need to make sure you've got all your ducks in a row before the game.
By half-time, it was all over. B-i-L and I actually stayed in the bar and watched the Chelsea match for the first 20 minutes, missing goals 5 and 6, but returned to see the consolation effort (much ironic cheering from our hosts, much sullen silence from their Italian guests) and the final flourish. When the wits of the Stretford End treated their Ultra friends to a chorus of "Who are ya?", which just goes to prove you don't need to be a Liverpool supporter to witness humourous and original banter at the footie.
Oh hang on - yes you do. But let's not dwell, bless 'em. There was probably headaches and nosebleeds all round the ground with the amount of noise they'd made in the preceding hour and a half. It was almost rowdy. In fact, as we were leaving, a lot of the older fans on the concourse were marvelling at the fact that the atmosphere had been the best they'd seen since 1843, which was sweet.
There were apparently more scuffles outside the ground after the match, although I didn't see any - we had headed off and got ourselves home to the civilised end of the East Lancs Road. It was a thoroughly enjoyable occasion - all the better for being free.
Oh all right then. I'll admit it. I was still disappointed United won. Especially as I have quite a decent hit rate of going to see them lose at theirs. But in the manner they won, well. You just have to take your hat off and say they deserved it. It'll just have to be Milan or Bayern that knocks them out instead.