Football Poets

I started watching football in the summer of 1982 when I was 9. But it is the truth that I attended some football matches with my father when I was just 5 or so. Then I was watching something that was strange. The men who fight for the ball were cried by the spectators. That meant nothing for me. But when I was 9 in 1982 the World Cup was coming and there has been much football on TV. My first reaction to the popularity of the game was big curiosity for what the TV speaks about the matches and the players. At the time the club from Zagreb, Dinamo won the championship and they became the first club I ever supported.The anthem of Dinamo was reasoning everywhere and I felt some pride about that. Someone who was photographed with his fetishisic white scarf was the coach of Dinamo and he used to call his player “My son” That was Miroslav Blazevic. Then the medias in Yugoslavia were speaking about the trip to Spain. Everything was in the colors of the forthcoming World Cup. Velimir Zajec ex Portsmouth manager was my first football idol and it was very important for me that he has played for Yugoslavia in Spain in 1982. In my home I was watching with my parents the game Spain-Yugoslavia and when Ivan Gudelj put Yugoslavia ahead I became so ecstatic that my father rushed to the room with the glass of water thinking I was sick.The referee of Danmark awarded the penalty to Spain for the fault commited outside of penalty area and repeated the missed penalty. Spain won 2-1. But this World Cup was remembered by the match Italy-Brazil 3-2 in which Paolo Rossi scored the hat-trick. I was living near the football ground of the football club whose name is Zeljeznicar and nickname Zeljo. When my club Dinamo started losing the match after match in 1982/1983 I was playing near my building when the noise from the stadium of Zeljeznicar for the goal sounded like the echo of the thousands’ peoples’ voices. I came through that change of heart and started attending the matches of Zeljeznicar. Always at the top were the clubs called ‘Big Four’ as my first club Dinamo, Red Star Belgrade, Partizan Belgrade and Hajduk Split. At the time I was attendig their matches Zeljeznicar were becoming something like the fifth best club in the country but having been playing at smaller ground than the likes of the Red Star it had a lot of meaning. The manager was former player Ivica Osim who created the passing football who was very advanced and some players have demonsrated the free-style tricks and dribbles as the famous bycicle dribble by Mirsad Baljic or rushing of the left winger Nikola Nikic. I enjoyed that period and witnessed the heart-breaking Uefa Cup semi final Zeljeznicar-Videoton in 1985. Whilst English clubs were baned after the Haysel disaster my club Zeljeznicar was not recovering from Videoton match where they were nearing the Uefa Cup Final with Real Madrid but conceded the shock goal which ended the dreams of this generation: “to be relatively small club in the Final of one of three European Cups” In the 1990 when the situation in Yugoslavia became bad I had lived through the other change adopting the Everton as the third club I have supported. The letter with the printed autographs of Everton side in 1990 came and I have received BBC VIDEO the official history of Everton. The dream was only one: To attend the match at Goodison.The memorable match of my early Everton years has been Everton v Liverpool in the F. A CUP fith round repllay. It was 4-4 draw and I was so celebrating this draw in which Everton equalised four times when I was in my room of my home in Sarajevo. Eventualy, I attended the match at Goodison in January 1998 in the third round of the FA CUP. But in the year 1999 I was on my summer holiday in Valencia and I was there few weeks. When Valencia was playing Barcelona in the semi-final of the Champions Leage in 2000 the result was Valencia 4 Barcelona 1 and the supporters of Valencia were singing “El si, si, si, vamos a Paris” Then Valencia was becoming the fourth club I have supported. Even a year later led by Gaizka Mendieta they almost won the Champions League losing on penalties in the final against Bayern in 2001. Then came the purchase of Chelsea and Manchester City and I retired as the football fan. I really retired feeling that I am supporting nobody in the footbal in which we know the winners before the matches will be played.