Sport é campeão!
It wasn't pretty, but it sure feels good. Sport is the 2006 Pernambuco champion.
Early Saturday afternoon a tv station reported that Sport had already sold the majority of the available tickets for Sunday's game. So Sunday I left home almost three hours before game time to make sure I could still get inside the stadium.
As I crossed the bridge over the river Capibaribe someone offered me a ticket for thirty reais. That frightened me, since the ticket usually costs around ten. I thought, the line at the ticket window has to be very long before thirty reais sounds reasonable. And the line was extremely long. Fortunately, just as I began to turn to find another scalper I heard someone say "Eightteen reais! If the money's in your hand when you approach, there won't be a problem." I got my money out and approached, and there was no problem.
Still more than two hours before kickoff, I entered the stadium hoping to find a decent place to stand. (The few times I have arrived close to kickoff I have spent the entire game on the lowest level of the terraces, with the grass at eye level.) The "geral" section of the stadium (behind the northwest goal) was already full, and the arquibancada frontal (along the south side of the stadium) was about half full. Or would have been, except for the inconvenient fact that the police had blocked off about half of the section, so ten thousand people were packing themselves into a section that could uncomfortably hold five. After what was probably only twenty minutes of hot, crowded, sweaty hell -- but what seemed like much longer -- the police opened the area and the crowd surged forward to claim their spaces.
I found a spot about two meters from midfield, and three steps up the terraces, from which I was close enough to the action but not so low that I couldn't see the other side of the field. And then I waited -- two hours in the tropical afternoon sun, in my fan's uniform (a red and black clown wig). Every fifteen minutes or so I took out my sunscreen and rubbed some into my face and neck. After some time I noticed that the man on my left had a large cardboard sign that he was using to give himself some shade.
"Move that sign over to the right," I said with a laugh, and he complied.
"Hold up your side," and I did so willingly.
After some time in the welcome shade of the sign, I asked him what it said on the other side.
"Mirela te amo," he replied.
I thought about the implications of holding a sign declaring my love for a woman who, to the best of my knowledge, I had never met.
"Yeah, I love Mirela," I told him.
"What?" Not yet angry.
"She's giving me shade."
He laughed. And a few minutes later we worked out that we had played soccer together once. For a city of three million people, Recife is a pretty small town.
Eventually the game started, and there's really no need to go into detail here. Sport needed to tie the game to win the championship, while Santa Cruz needed to win the game to force penalties. And, in the last minute of the second half, Santa scored off a corner kick to force penalties.
Santa shot first, and Gustavo -- Sport's goalie -- saved. Then Léo Oliveira's shot was saved, but the linesman ruled that the keeper had moved to early, and Léo Oliveira got a second chance. Which he clanged off the crossbar, and Sport had wasted a great chance. Both teams then converted the next two penalties. Santa found success on a third consecutive penalty, and their star forward was sent off for his obscene celebration in front of Sport's fans. Sport was denied, and the championship was at the feet of Santa Cruz. Grown men were crying in the stands around me. But Gustavo saved Sport, Sport converted the next penalty, and then both teams were successful.
For those of you who are right now thinking, "How lucky you were to see such drama!" I would like to say, "Fuck you." Drama is nice when my team isn't playing. I had no desire for drama. I wanted to see Sport win the championship emphatically, to the tune of 5-0 at the very least. The last thing I wanted to do was sweat through my clown wig while adults cried.
And then, on the next penalty, Gustavo dove to his right and swatted the ball away. Sport needed one penalty to win it all. Up stepped Hamilton, who was born in Alagoas (the state to the south of Pernambuco) but will represent Togo in this summer's World Cup, to set off the celebration. We chanted happy chants, we chanted obscene chants, we sang about our love for Sport.
Sport is the 2006 champion of Pernambuco. The natural order has been restored.
Olé olé olé olé olé
Olé olé olé olé olé
Sou rubronegro do coração
Eu sou do time que é sempre campeão!
Early Saturday afternoon a tv station reported that Sport had already sold the majority of the available tickets for Sunday's game. So Sunday I left home almost three hours before game time to make sure I could still get inside the stadium.
As I crossed the bridge over the river Capibaribe someone offered me a ticket for thirty reais. That frightened me, since the ticket usually costs around ten. I thought, the line at the ticket window has to be very long before thirty reais sounds reasonable. And the line was extremely long. Fortunately, just as I began to turn to find another scalper I heard someone say "Eightteen reais! If the money's in your hand when you approach, there won't be a problem." I got my money out and approached, and there was no problem.
Still more than two hours before kickoff, I entered the stadium hoping to find a decent place to stand. (The few times I have arrived close to kickoff I have spent the entire game on the lowest level of the terraces, with the grass at eye level.) The "geral" section of the stadium (behind the northwest goal) was already full, and the arquibancada frontal (along the south side of the stadium) was about half full. Or would have been, except for the inconvenient fact that the police had blocked off about half of the section, so ten thousand people were packing themselves into a section that could uncomfortably hold five. After what was probably only twenty minutes of hot, crowded, sweaty hell -- but what seemed like much longer -- the police opened the area and the crowd surged forward to claim their spaces.
I found a spot about two meters from midfield, and three steps up the terraces, from which I was close enough to the action but not so low that I couldn't see the other side of the field. And then I waited -- two hours in the tropical afternoon sun, in my fan's uniform (a red and black clown wig). Every fifteen minutes or so I took out my sunscreen and rubbed some into my face and neck. After some time I noticed that the man on my left had a large cardboard sign that he was using to give himself some shade.
"Move that sign over to the right," I said with a laugh, and he complied.
"Hold up your side," and I did so willingly.
After some time in the welcome shade of the sign, I asked him what it said on the other side.
"Mirela te amo," he replied.
I thought about the implications of holding a sign declaring my love for a woman who, to the best of my knowledge, I had never met.
"Yeah, I love Mirela," I told him.
"What?" Not yet angry.
"She's giving me shade."
He laughed. And a few minutes later we worked out that we had played soccer together once. For a city of three million people, Recife is a pretty small town.
Eventually the game started, and there's really no need to go into detail here. Sport needed to tie the game to win the championship, while Santa Cruz needed to win the game to force penalties. And, in the last minute of the second half, Santa scored off a corner kick to force penalties.
Santa shot first, and Gustavo -- Sport's goalie -- saved. Then Léo Oliveira's shot was saved, but the linesman ruled that the keeper had moved to early, and Léo Oliveira got a second chance. Which he clanged off the crossbar, and Sport had wasted a great chance. Both teams then converted the next two penalties. Santa found success on a third consecutive penalty, and their star forward was sent off for his obscene celebration in front of Sport's fans. Sport was denied, and the championship was at the feet of Santa Cruz. Grown men were crying in the stands around me. But Gustavo saved Sport, Sport converted the next penalty, and then both teams were successful.
For those of you who are right now thinking, "How lucky you were to see such drama!" I would like to say, "Fuck you." Drama is nice when my team isn't playing. I had no desire for drama. I wanted to see Sport win the championship emphatically, to the tune of 5-0 at the very least. The last thing I wanted to do was sweat through my clown wig while adults cried.
And then, on the next penalty, Gustavo dove to his right and swatted the ball away. Sport needed one penalty to win it all. Up stepped Hamilton, who was born in Alagoas (the state to the south of Pernambuco) but will represent Togo in this summer's World Cup, to set off the celebration. We chanted happy chants, we chanted obscene chants, we sang about our love for Sport.
Sport is the 2006 champion of Pernambuco. The natural order has been restored.
Olé olé olé olé olé
Olé olé olé olé olé
Sou rubronegro do coração
Eu sou do time que é sempre campeão!
posted by Venha Futuro at 3:03 PM
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