A fair Kop

EARLY ON the morning after another memorable European night at Anfield, men were at work repairing a lift in a Liverpool city centre hotel. The arrival of a latecomer was the cue for a burst of laughter and jeers.

“Didn’t think you’d be coming into work today, mate!”

The ensuing exchange was conducted in broad Scouse, suggesting that the object of the jibes was a Blue of the Merseyside rather than West London persuasion. Either way, he wasn’t going to take the Red crowing lying down.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed but, like, you haven’t won anything yet, have you? A semi-final? What’s that, like? What else have you won this season, then?”

Which is a fair point — though perhaps not one a fan of Everton should feel too cocky about making — but the needling wasn’t about to be indulged by Liverpool fans still high on the drama of a penalty shoot-out victory over Chelsea. With the euphoria of the night still casting a fuzzy glow over large parts of the city, the start of the day shift was not the time for a nagging reality check.

With Liverpool and Chelsea meeting for the second time in two years in a Champions League semi-final second leg in the same venue, there had been a lot of lively spectres about the place in Anfield the previous night, not the least of them that so-called “ghost goal” by Luis Garcia which had been enough to settle the tie in 2005 and see Liverpool through to their celebrated final triumph in Istanbul.

Even veterans of the press box and former players agreed that the atmosphere in the old ground last time around had been sufficiently seismic to make that recent earthquake in Kent seem like a minor blip. Your correspondent was fortunate to be present on the night and, when Garcia’s controversial goal was allowed, I recalled what they used to say about how the Kop, with a combined intake of breath, could almost literally suck a ball over the goal line. No matter that, in the intervening two years, Jose Mourinho had spent a lot of time vainly trying to suck it back out again, the goal stood — and if Chelsea were ever going to erase its memory, then last Tuesday night was the time and place in which to do it.

That they couldn’t was down to their sluggishness and nervousness in the face of the clenched-fist, sleeves-rolled-up spirit which Liverpool seem to have on tap for big European nights at Anfield. Steven Gerrard, so often their inspiration, was industrious rather than explosive, for example, but that was perfectly in keeping with the general thrust of a display which emphasised the collective rather than the individual.

And, as ever, the crowd played its part, not least when ensuring that rattled Chelsea were obliged to take their penalties against a backdrop of quite deafening noise — and, remember, they weren’t even shooting into the Kop end.

2005 might have just have edged this one in terms of the raw intensity of the atmosphere but perhaps only because the first time is always bound to be that little bit extra special. But we’re only talking a matter of degrees. Liverpool, the team, may lack consistency but Liverpool, the crowd, invariably operates at something close to 100%.

And when Anfield is in full cry, Old Trafford, despite its proximity, doesn’t come close. In my experience, you’d have to travel to the north-east of England — to Newcastle or Sunderland — or even as far north as Glasgow, to find a comparable fervour in the upper echelons of British football.

Partly this has to do with still tangible working class base of Liverpool’s support and the vibrant sense of passionate identification the fans have with the city and the club. One banner at Tuesday’s game summed up a rebel spirit which might even strike a chord in Cork: “We’re not English. We are Scouse.” The awful tragedy of Hillsborough has also acted as an emotional glue to keep the fans and the club united.

Much is written these days about how the elite Premiership footballers — and even some of the also-rans — are removed from the real world by virtue of their vast wealth and celebrity lifestyles. Somehow, Liverpool’s players still seem to have it both ways — the big houses and the flash cars and the spreads in ‘Hello’, yes, but also a tangible sense of shoulder to shoulder solidarity with the boys and girls on the Kop.

And then there’s the matter of the club anthem. When, before kick off at Anfield, the PA plays ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ and then cuts out to allow the massed ranks of the fans, their scarves held proudly aloft, to take the song to its glorious crescendo, it is simply a spine-tingling sound and spectacle, no matter what your footballing persuasion. Even more than that famous sign in the tunnel, it’s the moment which tells you: this is Anfield. And, as a means of setting the emotional temperature for the 90 minutes of action, I suspect that it’s one of the key reasons why the Kop has adapted to all-seating far better than, say, the Stretford End.

Of course, the fans’ repertoire has been extended to keep tabs with changing times. Currently top of the Kop’s hit parade is a song, to the tune of the Beach Boys’ ‘Sloop John B’, which reminds visitors that Liverpool won the European Cup for the fifth time in Istanbul. And it goes on: “It’s only on loan, it’s only on loan — in ancient Greece, we’ll bring it back home.”

After putting five goals past Man United, Milan will have something to say about that. And the Evertonian lift-repair man might agree with the disc jockey I heard on local radio, who chortled: “Liverpool’s season could still come Acropolis.”