From Reuters
--------------
LONDON (Reuters) - On the day Sol Campbell moved from Tottenham Hotspur to Arsenal on a free transfer in July 2001, Spurs fans hung the effigy of their former club captain from a lamp post outside White Hart Lane.
When Luis Figo, an idol at Barcelona, returned to the Nou Camp for the first time wearing Real Madrid colours a few months after his world record transfer in 2000, disgusted Barca' fans hurled a pig's head at him as he stepped up to take a corner.
And when Mo Johnston moved from Celtic to Rangers -- via the French club Nantes -- in 1988, effigies of the Scotland striker were strung up outside both Ibrox and Parkhead.
Hardcore Rangers fans even burnt their replica shirts and season-ticket books in protest -- but soon returned as the club embarked on a run of nine straight championship titles.
Now Leeds United fans -- who in the past have seen Gordon McQueen, Joe Jordan, Eric Cantona and Rio Ferdinand all move to Old Trafford -- have something else to feel let down about, as if relegation and debt was not bad enough.
Alan Smith, their hero, their one last golden boy, has committed the ultimate sin. He is joining the hated Manchester United and is the latest recruit to what the fans term The Judas Iscariot Club -- the ultimate betrayers.
All over the world fans love and hate the heroes who play for their chosen teams, sometimes at the same time. But none of them can forgive what they perceive to be betrayal by those few special players who come to embody the very spirit of their clubs for them.
The reason Campbell's move from Spurs to Arsenal was so painful was because he had been at Spurs since he was 14 years old and was the club captain.
Moreover, his departure to their bitterest rivals just down the road merely confirmed to Spurs fans what they already knew in their hearts -- that Arsenal was a far bigger and more successful club.
Nothing in the meantime has changed that perception and Campbell now has a pocket full of medals he would not have won if he had stayed at Spurs.
DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE
Campbell always protested his loyalty and saw his move from a totally different perspective than from the fans who once worshipped him.
As far as Campbell was concerned, he was at the end of his contract and free to leave. The fact he went to Arsenal left the fans seething. But as far as he was concerned, he was merely starting a new job with better prospects than his last.
Which is exactly how Alan Smith of United feels. That is, Alan Smith of Manchester United, who, until this week was Alan Smith of Leeds United.
Smith's move from the United of Leeds to the United of Manchester will unite the fans of Leeds in a way nothing else has done since the club's brief period of dominance in England under Don Revie in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Their miserable season ended with the inevitable relegation to the first division this month and with the club still tens of millions of pounds in debt, a sale of their best players was inevitable.
But while all around them was crumbling, Leeds fans could at least hold on to the dream symbolised by Smith. Yorkshire-born, a Leeds fan since he was a boy, Smith was the epitome of the badge-kissing, 'I-love-this-club-more-than-I-love-my-mum' faux loyalty which so many players display today.
In reality the only thing players love more than their mums is the size of their paychecks and when Manchester United come calling offering a King's ransom for their services, players don't wait to be asked twice.
JUST A JOB
Last September Smith told Leeds fans the one club he could never play for was Manchester United. What else could he say? But he'll be kissing their badge next season after moving across the Pennines from Yorkshire to Lancashire for 7.05 million pounds on Wednesday.
Like Campbell, Figo, Johnston and countless others before him, Smith the footballer is not Smith the fan.
In the end it's just a job. It might have been a dead-end job at Leeds, but Manchester United offers Smith the chance of more money, more trophies and enhanced international prospects.
It also offers him the chance of a lifetime of loathing from Leeds fans and he might well need an armed guard next time he is back in Yorkshire, but he can live with that.
Fans, in reality, cannot change their clubs, but players do it all the time, and the only thing that both are guilty of is thinking that anyone believes that loyalty matters in soccer.
In fact it doesn't, but perhaps FIFA should now make kissing the badge a yellow card offence -- purely for insulting everyone's intelligence.
As for Sol Campbell. He never supported Spurs as a boy and he doesn't support Arsenal either.
Once asked where he would like his ashes scattered if he was ever cremated he replied: "At Upton Park. West Ham -- that's where it all started for me."
Logically then, knowing who West Ham fans hate most, he could well finish his career at Millwall -- kissing the badge as he walks through the door.
No comments:
Post a Comment