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Please find below Si's article on the Madrid vs Arsenal match. The article is to be published by Arsenal Times.
El Milagrio en Madrid
4.00am
I have always loved this time of day. The heating is off; you can’t see anything and the smelly dog has decided to sleep on your bed. His breath smells like he’s been chewing the fat with the local whore down at the fishmongers.
I’ve got 10 minutes to get my arse into gear. My travelling companions are due to pick me up shortly to drive us on to Gatwick airport from where we will fly to Alicante and finally take the 4 hour train journey to Madrid the home of tonight’s nemesis, the ‘white ghosts’ of Real.
I sink a jug of coffee and tick off the essentials to take on my journey:
Fake Stone Island coat… Check.
Fake Arsenal away shirt with no. 9 and Reyes on the back (lucky shirt)… Check.
Passport… Check.
Clean pair of pants… Check.
I am ready for battle. Unleash purgatory!
There is one problem though; my wife has recently decided to become a vegetarian. Because of this recent health kick that has happened I’m generally eating vege too and my wind is indeed a wind of change.
Holy moly it sounds like I have solved the mystery of Glenn Miller’s disappearance. It seems to all intent and purposes he has set up home in my anus.
My mates Lol and Ben pick me up and we make our way through the chilly night towards the Sussex airport.
I apologise in advance to my mates about the tremors they are feeling coming from the rear of the motor.
We’ve been looking forward to this trip for a while. We decided at the beginning of the season if a monster draw comes up we are offskies. Well there is nothing bigger than playing Real Madrid in their own yard and so here we are.
Instead of flying to Madrid direct for £250.00 we decided to take the plane to Alicante for £50.00 and then the train onto the capital for 60 euros. We have managed to get tickets via Lol’s Dad who lives in Alicante. His Dad has phoned his lawyer in madrid, his lawyer has left them with his receptionist in his office in Madrid for us to pick up. The tickets cost 85 euros. So even with our match tickets we have beaten any direct flight price, even what Stelios was offering.
At the time of the draw for the last sixteen of the Champions league we were in confident mood. Arsenal are not having the greatest of seasons, but at the time Madrid were having a worse one and were playing total pony, in fact we thought there will never be a better time to play the galacticos. How time has changed. Madrid are on fire and we are… Well we are behind Spurs.
Our defence is in total and utter turmoil. Senderos has gone off the boil and his confidence is shot. Cole is still out and our second string left back, Clichy, is injured. So we’ll start with Flamini, a midfielder, at left back. This is the midfielder that cannot cement a place in the midfield, so we’ll let him mark Beckham. Lauren our tough as right back is injured so Eboué, a child, will mark Zidane. Christ.
The only good news is the return of Toure from his recent jaunt in the African Cup of Nations.
On the wing, Reyes: This is the game we need him to turn up in. If he plays a stormer it will be good for everyone, we’ll be over the moon with his sudden return to form and he’ll be noticed by the home front media for the world cup squad, plus another Spanish club might want to buy him and he can jump from our sinking ship.
Put it this way we are not over confident. We’ll just have to stand our ground and fight.
At the airport the ‘faux’ chilli has hit its middle eight and my orchestra pit is not a happy badger.
Once on the plane a nutter seems confused about us wearing arsenal colours. ‘No, no you want to fly to Madrid’.
No we don’t now bugger off you nonce. It’s 6.00 am and this bloke is already on the sauce.
After two hours we get to Alicante and head for the train station. On the train we have four hours to kill, so we head for the bar. There are plenty of Gooners who have thought of the round-the-houses-on-a-budget trip as well. They make great drinking partners and by the time we hit Madrid I’m sloshed. Most of the blokes we meet on the train have not got tickets, they have been phoning around to others who have already arrived. At the moment the tout price is £140.00. One of them thinks they will watch it in a bar, ‘I’m not paying that much to watch the Arsenal get skinned’.
Fair enough. For most of us tonight is about damage limitation.
In Madrid we pick up the tickets, have a jig down the street and find a café for some grub. We order three different dishes, but we all seem to get the same thing, bit of bread and a whole lot of mayonnaise. More mayo than I have seen in a while, and I tell you I’ve seen some mayonnaise in my time and no mistake.
We find a dirt-cheap hostel offering a bed for 17 euros a night. It is called International Youth Hostel La Posada De Huertas. If you are going to pop over for a match, it comes highly recommended as it is central, clean, has a shower and also lockers so you can safely dump your stuff there while you go out post match celebrating/drowning your sorrows.
You can check them out at www.posadadehuertas.com
I wouldn’t take your bird there for a dirty weekend though.
Off to the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu. The metro ride is short and the directions are simple enough for non-Castilians to understand. We are well excited and praying for the all important 0-0 draw. If we can just keep the doors closed… If Jens is on form and doesn’t throw one of his paddies, if our totally inexperienced full backs can shut out the Madrid wingers, If Zidane has an off night, if Senderos can keep Ronaldo at bay, if… It does not look promising.
The Bernabeu rises into the sky. It is vast and stark in design. A brutalist symbol of victory. It says fortress, it says power, and it says get a result at Real Madrid? You’re having a laugh.
Thousands of Gooners have made the trip and the bar, which seems allocated to the away fans, runs out of beer quickly. People start hitting the top shelf, should be interesting three thousand Arsenal fans on G&Ts and whisky.
The inside of the stadium is beautiful. More tiers than you can shake a stick at. Although immense it is compact. Our seats are a joke; the lawyer has come through big style. We are ten rows from the pitch and on the halfway line. Them bleedin’ galacticos are so close it’s like having your Nan over for lunch. Beckham is doing his best impression of a movie star and Woodgate is doing his best impression of professional footballer. Zizou the bald one, before my very eyes, Carlos the tiny one, Ronaldo the chubby one, Robinho the new one and Guti the crap one. If only these galacticos were playing some other team, it might be a joy to watch them ply their trade.
Madrid’s anthem 'Hala Madrid' blares out around the ground, but the thousands of Gooners are doing their club proud singing in unison. The atmosphere is everything we were hoping for. Flags and banners are draped from the top tier to our right where the travelling contingent is situated.
We are surrounded by Madridistas and are unsure what to do about vocally supporting our team. As soon as the game kicks off, it is impossible to hold back and our colours come out and we scream for our players. It is amazing what fourteen beers can do for a man’s courage. In fact most of the dudes around us don’t seem to mind anyway, they are a pretty friendly bunch.
Arsenal start by playing the ball around, on the floor and linking up well.
This makes me angry, I want them to hoof it, kick it up the other end or into orbit, anything but let Madrid get the ball and cause us trouble.
Woodgate is taken off as his left thigh injury returns to haunt him. The replacement is Mejia, who will have to mark Henry. So all of a sudden the psychological advantage seems to swing to us. This might happen, after all Real are only a football team aren’t they?
At half time I head to the bar, the queue is gargantuan but the fact that they sell beer keeps me in line. At the front of the queue I am informed that they have run out and are only selling non-alcoholic beer. Great. Still at least we have something. I head back to the boys, Ben’s jumping up and down on the steps between the seat rows waiting for me, he has a smile the size of the ground on his mush. He informs me of the score: 1-0, Henry.
Lol looks like a lottery winner who has just been informed of his prize, but is looking around for Jeremy Beadle.
Unreal. I can’t even get pissed off about missing the goal.
When the final whistle blows, we jump around like nutters, hug one another and salute the travelling masses in song. Most of the Madrid fans we encounter want to shake our hands, they still seem pretty convinced that they will do the job in N5.
I’m not sure though. Tonight Arsenal embarrassed Madrid and the fans (myself included) that have been coating them off in recent times. The game was one for all and all for one. It seemed we had jumped in a time machine and were watching the invincibles again.
Get a result at Real Madrid? You’re having a laugh.
Win the Champions League? Are we having a laugh?
Simon Rance 2006-02-23
Simon Rance is the author of ‘The FC Nantes Experiment: One man’s odyssey of French football’ available from amazon.co.uk
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