Monday 13 October 2014

Why Liverpool?

   I've been a Liverpool fan for the better part of forty years and loved every minute of it, but why Liverpool whenI've lived in the North East of England for the last thirty years, my whole family are Sunderland supporters and most my friends don't even like football preferring rugby.  The easy answer is they are a wrong, Sunderland are a great team with great supporters and rugby is a fabulous sport that I have enjoyed playing for years, but nothing compares to Liverpool.  My first experiences of the reds came in the mid seventies when we, as a family lived in Cheshire, the kids at school all supported either Liverpool or United and I suppose I followed my immediate friends in supporting Liverpool.  By1977 the success of my new team made it impossible to think of supporting anybody else.  My first real memory of following the reds came in the FA Cup semi final replay of that year, I was to young to be allowed to stay up to find out the result but my mum promised to write the result on a peace of paper and stick it to the ceiling over my bed so it would be the first thing I saw when I woke up in the morning.  "Liverpool 3 Everton 0 Well done xx" was the message I saw the following morning. The well done was the first time I was included in the success, we are all part of Liverpool, players, management, owners and probably most importantly the supporters win or loose we are all in it together at Liverpool more than any other club in the world my mum knew it and now I did to.
   The Liverpool family were not the reason I started supporting Liverpool but they are one of the main reasons I have continued to support with more and more passion as the years go by.  The passion of the fans, the humour, the knowledge are all reasons that I'm proud to be part of the support for this club, we are world famous, our ground is world famous as are our songs, banners and anthem and I'm yet to hear of a player who doesn't want to play in front of the Kop who make the hairs stand up even now, even when only watching on television.  I'm very proud to be known as a Liverpool supporter, despite what they say I know deep down they are all jealous, they all want what we have. 

    

   My first game was at Anfield in October 1978 my dad got some tickets Liverpool v Chelsea, I remember walking in to the ground and was immediately struck by how green the pitch was, that still gets me every time I walk in, we won the game 2-0 Kenny scored the second can't remember the first, probably because I was totally fascinated by the crowd and the Kop in particular, the excitement, the occasion, the result, the players, the crowd everything was as I hoped and more I was smitten.  My dad realised he had made a mistake, I was supposed to follow Sunderland, I overheard him on the phone to his brother "what do I do know he's never going to follow us they were bloody brilliant", it was decided I should go see Sunderland the very next week at Boundry Park, Oldham and all I could think about was how were Liverpool getting on against Everton.  I spent the entire time with a radio pressed up against my ear trying to find out the news from Goodison, whilst a boring 0-0 was played out in front of me against the backdrop of depressed fans in a tired looking stadium, that was it Liverpool for life, even my dad had to admit defeat.  Probably the best decision I ever made, I still do keep an eye out for how the Mackems are doing though.
    Through school I always had the upper hand in any argument over football, we were the best and nobody could argue.  Throughout my lifetime we have had some of the greatest players in Europe Keegan, Dalglish, Souness, Hansen, Lawrenson, Rush, Barnes, Fowler, Owen, Gerrard, Carragher, Torres, Suarez all fabulous players and just the tip of the iceberg.  We seem to have had more than our share of great managers, we won trophy after trophy, breaking records with our levels of success, nobody has yet come close, how could a boy not fall in love with that.  Even over the last twenty years we have had our moments nobody can forget 2005 probably the greatest final of all time and we won it and just look at the team sheets we were not even on the same planet as Milan on paper but we won  it, the fans, the manager and the players we won it together just as we will win again together and I for one want to be a part of it.

@lfclumo


   

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