Whenever I talk or discuss racism with any of my friends, the first thing that comes to my mind is a photograph of John Barnes – one of the most famous players ever to have donned the England shirt. It is a picture of John Barnes, in the good ol’ skintight kit, seems to be controlling the ball, which isn’t even in the picture. A closer looks reveals that he is actually back-heeling a banana, which was thrown onto the pitch by the opposition fans. It was not an attempt to put him off his game. It was much deeper than that – Hate. The problem was the color of his skin.

As the eighties drew to a close, incidents related to racism were increasingly rare as compared to the early days due to number of black players in the game. A few big money transfers helped the cause to a large extent. The player is again John Barnes. He moved to Liverpool from Watford. And Paul Ince moved from WestHam United to Manchester United. Things were expected to improve.

Within two years of Barnes’ arrival at Anfield, something happened which would change the face of English football forever – Hillsborough. The death of ninety-six Liverpool fans and the Lord Justice Taylor report led to the inception of the Premiership. Although there were also commercial reasons which helped in bringing about the change.

The first ball was kicked in the English Premier League on 15th August 1992. Manchester United, with their new signing Eric Cantona and the likes of Paul Ince, Dennis Irwin and Ryan Giggs, won the inaugural edition of the Premiership. Then followed the double! Together with the Premiership, “Kick Racism” was born in 1993. In 1994-95, most of the clubs had signed the anti-racism message and it reached the fans. The key was to combat racism inside and outside the ground.

Everything was going on well until Manchester United star Eric Cantona was sent-off at Selhurst Park for an off-the-ball incident against Crystal Palace. An enraged Cantona reacted angrily to abuse from a fan in what was described as the “Kung Fu” kick on Mathew Simmons.

The incident sent shock waves throughout the footballing world and there were claims to ban Cantona from playing Professional football again. Cantona’s legal team claimed that the player was subjected to racist abuse which most certainly saved Cantona from a lifetime ban. Enter John Barnes again. He famously said, “It took a white Frenchman to be assaulted in our league before racism was taken seriously”.

As days went by, black players had become an integral part of the league. While there were isolated incidents, the fight against racism was considered a success. Buoyed by the success of “Kick Racism”, an independent body funded by the FA, PFA et al. called “Kick it out” was born.

While racism looked under control in England, the scene was not very promising in the other European countries. There were many incidents of players being subjected to racist abuse. England striker Emile Heskey has been at the end of numerous racist abuses whenever he traveled as part of the England National Squad. Other players including Ashley Cole, Jermaine Jenas has also suffered the same fate. Liverpool boos Gerard Houllier even went to the extent of letting everyone know that his team would walk out if the players were subjected to racist abuse.

Things went from bad to worse when Ron Atkinson called Chelsea player Marcel Desailly as a “fucking lazy, thick nigger”. Players from other countries who plied their trade in the Premier League were also at the receiving end of racist abuses, most notably Dwight Yorke, Sylvian Wiltord and Thierry Henry. Worse was yet to come. Spanish National Team coach Luis Arogones referred to Henry as “that black sh*t”. The scene in the rest of Europe was not pretty.

In England, Thierry Henry led the fight against racism by launching “Stand Up, Speak Up” initiative. Everything looked fine with the support it received. The involvement of Rio Ferdinand meant that Arsenal and Manchester United were all set to wear special training shirts during their clash in February. While it looked brilliantly positive from outside, all was not well, when a few Manchester United players refused to wear the training shirt. Patrick Viera took a pop at Gary Neville in the tunnel, which incensed Roy Keane who produced an inspired performance in the game that United went onto win 4-2.

While there were questions regarding Nike’s involvement in the Anti-racism movement, nothing concrete came out of it. However, another row exploded when Wayne Rooney handed out Anti-racism bands to the England players in the dressing room during an international match. This led to Gary Neville going public blasting Nike of using Anti-racism to promote their brand. It was astonishing when one considers the fact that Nike had a 10-year contract with Manchester United and Rio Ferdinand was a central figure in the launch of Stand Up, Speak Up. That public outburst also explained the reason for the tunnel incident at Highbury. But the matter of the fact is – He was right!

There is little doubt that the various Anti-racism groups have achieved amazing things. Players have fought their way past racism. We have had Andy Cole, Dwight Yorke, who were victims of racist abuse, lead Manchester United to a treble in 1999. Theirry Henry led Arsenal to an unbeaten season that stretched to 49 games. Paul Ince has taken up coaching and soon we’ll have black manager in the top flight and in administration. Well, why not?

“Rugby fans watch the game, Football fans watch their team”. And that’s exactly the way it should be. Football, as a game, is played by millions of players every week. Millions watch it, read about it, listen to it and discuss it. Births, weddings, funerals are arranged around it. Football is the only religion worth talking about for many, including you and me. It is time to give back something to the game that has given us a lot. We should not be bothered by the color of the player on the pitch. As fans, all that should matter is the color of shirt of the team that we root for.

We say, Jean, read the news, daily. Remember how Sir wanted to sign another Central Midfielder when we played Sporting?

Rafael Benitez has come out and shared Stevie G’s sentiments. “Everyone at Liverpool shares Steven’s sentiments, there is no question about that. We wanted to be further up the table and the fact that we are not is a disappointment to everyone. ‘

So next year we will do that.

Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher has been arrested and cautioned by police for common assault. The former England international, 30, was questioned on Wednesday about a roadside argument with a man near his Crosby home on Tuesday.

He hasn’t thrown coins at anyone; he hasn’t climbed the pitch wall or hurled profanities at rival fans. He hasn’t assaulted anyone, too.

Frank Rijkaard is interested in the Chelsea job. But his brother says “Frank is happy in Spain and has money, enough to eat two steaks a day”

Two steaks a day, that looks like Chelsea material right Chunky?

The former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra flew back home today for the first since he was ousted in a coup 17 months ago, and immediately surrendered to immigration police who arrested him on corruption charges.

Manchester City, enough said.

Tom Hicks today claimed he has the power to block any attempt by Liverpool co-owner George Gillett to sell his half of the club. Hicks this week insisted he had no intention of parting with his own 50% stake at Anfield, despite renewed interest from Dubai International Capital.

We are in this together. There is no way in hell you are getting out of this mess alone.

An early goal by midfielder Amy Kane saw Everton pull off a massive shock to win the Women’s Premier League Cup.

And when it comes to the real “beautiful football”… Sigh!

Keegan says he needs five new players to transform the team.

             Yes, and we are guessing the names are Maradona, Pele, Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Zidane. Cheque please.  Kevin Keegan is still searching for the thing he was smoking while he took Mike Ashley’s call. We also hear Sam Allardyce doesn’t need ether anymore.

Arsenal midfielder Cesc Fabregas says he has become more team-focused in the last year after admitting that he used to “want to show more of his own stuff” and was guilty of playing as an individual.

Does it mean we don’t get to see this anymore?

“Why do you support man utd ?” A million fans. A million different answers.Each one will go on and on for hours about the greatness of the club,but will still end by saying that they cant possibly put it in words.

 My friend put that question to me on the eve of my 12th  board chemistry exam and considering i had spent more than 1500 hours watching them play in the past 3 years he expected quite a long answer .But shocking as it may sound , I really had no answer for him. Now,don’t get me wrong. Its not as if i could not have given him the usual monologue about the Treble ,the dominance, the players, the manager and countless other things. I pride myself on being a competent speaker and could have let him have it for asking such a stupid question. It might sound very dramatic to some but something unexplainable was stopping me. The surge of emotions i felt was too personal to put in words. I did not say anything and my friend having read my expression didn’t push it. As i went to sleep that night I thought about that question. Why could I not answer him? I admit,this question gave me many a sleepless nights.

 Its been almost two and a half years since that day and although I still have no answer for his question,I am beginning to understand why I could not answer him. You see, in some ways the love for MAN UTD is like the love for your country. The answer lies deeper than just because you were born there. Its too close to your heart to say it out loud. But still,I have decided that I will give it another try. Chances are i will fail more miserably than last time,but this time i have the comfort of knowing i am speaking to fellow fans who will understand my plight.

 As supporters of Man Utd, we are lucky enough to be cheering for a club that actually delivers (unlike some other clubs,wink wink ). The no. of trophies that adorn our cabinet are a just gauge of the dominance we have had over English football in the recent decade. Considering the no. of times we have chased down big leads in the table or come back to win the match after trailing ,shows how determined to win our players are. No matter how bad our form is,no matter how many players we have injured we never let that be an excuse in our never ending pursuit of excellence.Since the inception of the Premier League we have won 16 titles and 11 FA cups. But even this was not enough.In the magical season of ‘99 we topped everything. We became the first English club to win the treble. Who can forget the now legendary lines
~”Manchester united have entered the promise land.”

 But it is not just recent success that sets our club apart.Historically our club is second to none. Our long and illustrious history is marked by incidents both proud and profoundly sad.The Munich tragedy. Just thinking about that horrendous tragedy is enough to move any fan to tears. Feb 6th,1958–In one moment,a whole club was torn apart and the whole footballing world was brought to a standstill. We lost 8 players of our squad–a squad that would have surely conquered the world if it was not for the cruel turn of fate. “The flowers of Manchester” as they were justly called included some of the best talents in the world at that time. Such a terrible tragedy would have been enough to destroy any other club.But did we bow down to our miseries and give up?? No,that is just not the United way. The way we rose from the disaster like a Phoenix out of the ashes under the Leadership of the legendary Sir Matt Busby is the stuff of legends. It was the perfect reward for our perseverance that in 1958 we became the First English club to win the European cup beating Benfica 4-1. “We are Man Utd,and we will never die”.

 The greatness of MAN UTD lies not in what it has achieved ,but the way in which we have done it. Our trademark style of playing football has never left us, i.e ; fast and attacking. No matter how much the chips are down we never stop going for goal. It can perhaps be defined best by saying “If you hit 3,we will hit 5″. This is no surprise considering the players that have been a part of our squad. From Duncan Edwards,George Best, Bobby Charlton, to Eric ‘The King’ Cantona,Captain Fantastic Roy Keane and the golden generation of Giggs,Scholes,Beckham we have always battled  to be the best. Perhaps that is the reason,why so much is expected of the current Light Bearers ie; Rooney,Ronaldo,Brown,VDS et al. And it makes me very proud to say that I am yet to be disappointed.

 Since the day I joined the 2939,my experience and perspective has grown in leaps and bounds. I have met many fans most of whose knowledge of the club is far more than mine. Whenever i talk to them, i find every reply of theirs oozing passion for the club. They would literally do anything to see united win. There are people from India,Pakistan,UK,Canada,Brazil and many other countries. Some are as young as 13 while others are happily married with flourishing family lives and jobs. So much diversity and yet amazingly they get along perfectly well. People accept the authority of the moderators without knowing them just because they get an opportunity to discuss something that they love. Its not like they don’t argue among themselves,but heaven save any rival who speaks ill of the club. The camaraderie that the club inspires among fans is mind-blowing.

 No fan can deny the feeling of immense pleasure felt seeing Rooney score from a perfect Ronaldo cross or watching  O’shea score the winner in the dying moments. The euphoria after such a win lasts for days making you smile whenever you think about it. Or the gut wrenching feeling of watching us go down 1-2 against city or watching Scholes being sent of just 11 minutes into the game. Or the profound pride felt watching Ole Gunnar Solskjaer walk down Old Trafford amidst thunderous applause from crowd and squad alike.This capacity of affecting millions of lives is nothing short of Magical.

 This is why I love MANCHESTER UNITED,the Greatest football club. Period.

One constantly yaps at bigger dogs. The other is just a Yorkshire Terrier.

Abdul Raouf

One’s horrendously ugly, can run long distances and can do fuckall with a football……The other appeared in the LOTR Movie Trilogy.

Thanks to Hasan Ejas.

Emotions that I went through yesterday were intense. But is this exactly unexpected? Did it come out of the blue? No. This was waiting to happen. What do managers tell their players before they meet Arsenal ? “Kick them, hurt them, push them off the ball?”What did the Reading defender ( I forget his name) say before the Reading match ? “I am going to kick Adebayor because that is the only way to control him”.
This is the English game , the “English” attitude. When Arsene complained he was asked to shut up and stop whining.
When teams face Arsenal they first thing on their agenda is to grievously injure the players so that they soften up and stop playing football. And the press,the fans all support it. They say foreigners cannot play “English” football.
Right now its not about winning the PL or titles - its about the right of football players to have a relatively safe career. Football is a rough game , accidents happen but the horror and the savagery has become unbelievable. Players getting rough because they see no other option to stop the opposition.
If this is English football - God help us.

Sajit

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http://www.liverpoolfc.tv/news/drilldown/NG158824080213-1007.htm

Benitez’s league record outstrips Ferguson’s in every possible way when comparing their respective first four years in charge, and while football has changed, and the past cannot be compared to the present with total accuracy, the fact is that no-one in the world thought Alex Ferguson could ever win a league title at United, and certainly not the United fans holding up banners asking for him to be sacked.

Dear Paul

I think I perfectly understand the mounting ginormity of frustration levels at Anfield, among the faithful KOP, Ex-Greats, not so greats(Read : Redknapp) etc. But instead of retaliating, why don’t you try to take a look at yourselves and then post something (which at the best can be summed up as Deluded).

Moving on,

How possibly could you compare the first four years of Ferguson and Rafa and not be ashamed of it? And now that you HAVE done so in public, I would really love to know the reasoning behind that comparison. Also,  what is with the new “excuse”? Psychological barriers? Jeysus, give us a break Paul. I hope you realize how ridiculous that sounds and i do, sincerely too. If Rafa cant get a result against the others from Top Three even after all the “time” he had, he doesnt belong here, simply put.  To put the tactics adopted by Rafa under the ’scope, while he should be finishing off(I mean Kill), the likes of Birmingham, Sunderland etc. he tries to sneak it. What is the point of a narrow 1-0 against mighty Brum? We are not talking Wigan Athletic here. This is Liverpool for Pete’s sake.

Moving on,
What is with the utter negativity after Liverpool take a lead? Suddenly everyone on the pitch gets reprogrammed for defending. When you should be looking for the Second or Third, you will be looking at protecting the 1-0.

Again, what is with this starting line-up? I am not pundit to discuss strategy here, but simple man, simple observations, that is me. Dirk Kuyt, what has he done to deserve a starting place in the Liverpool Line-up? He is a striker, is supposed to score goals, finish them off, find the back of the net. It doesn’t matter how many miles you have ran for that 90 minutes.  Theline-up which will be “brilliantly” explained by Ms. Maca and Co on ESPN with the help of the dumbest innovation of the millennium - The Tiger Telestrator - will show a wide 4-4-2 which at the whistle becomes a packed 4-5-1.
How many more will you lose this way? How many more uber-boring 0-0’s and 1-1s will you grind out Paul? How many more mediocre signings will it take for Rafa to finally realize that he is not Premiership material? How many more Pennants and Kewells will it take for him to realize that ONE Fernando the Second will NOT win you the league?

Cheers to the last sip of the Green Fairy
Good Luck and Prayers
Raju

PS : Couple of pointers Paul

1) I believe you know about the “famous” Sealy and Co when fergie took over at OT.
2) What all problems did Rafa has to deal when he came to Anfield?
From: Paul Tomkins

Date: Feb 19, 2008 4:25 PM
Subject: Re: In reply to : TOMKINS: PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS
To: Raju Sunny

>
> How possibly could you compare the first four years of Ferguson and
> Rafa and not be ashamed of it? And now that you HAVE done so in
> public, I would really love to know the reasoning behind that
> comparison with the squad he had. and Yes i am talking about
> the infamous Sealy and co , Paul.

Man United prior to Ferguson:

1982   3rd
1983   3rd
1984   4th
1985   4th
1986   4th

Ferguson arrives:

1987   11th
1988   2nd
1989   11th
1990   13th

Ferguson broke the British transfer record at the time, and spent more
than anyone else. He was trying to end 20 years of desperation for the
title - a pretty obvious comparison. His first trophy was in year
four. So in every way, Benítez outstrips him in the first four years.

Goodbye.

PAUL

Wow, how convenient, paul? Pretty straightforward too.

This is our take : Post Inter Game

Paul,
Great day eh?
Inter Humiliated, and Pool finally playing like the team they were supposed to be, DK scoring.. good day indeed. This renders the whole “Psychological Barrier” argument null don’t you think?

I mean Inter is not your average Italian bore-fest. They are a credible attacking unit, ho can score at will away from home too, League, cup whatever. Spanking them so majestically doesn’t open your eyes? For once pool looked like a Premier League team. Without the characteristic Rafa negativity, the boring continental game. What is preventing pool from playing this game, week-in week-out? Psychological barrier? A Rocket, up Rafa’s?

Statistically speaking, isn’t the league also a two legged 38-match cup? So what he basically needs is to give Reading/Wigan the same kind of respect Barca deserve. Also, when you are in running for one cup come the end of the season, it isn’t much of a surprise that you have some ’success’ there, is it? Winning them in penalties at that!

Good day Paul.
Cheers to the spanking
Raju and Haynes

Reply : Not yet in, an not expecting either.