Pondering Calcio

A special match on Saturday made me think about the special relationship one can have with a football team and the real magic of the game. Bear with me as I try to decipher my irrational relationship with an Old Lady and the Dark Forces. Some of you might even recognise bits and pieces of your own Calcio-polluted soul in there as well, despite cheering for a different team. That is, if I’m not just a complete nutcase …

Juventus’ win over AC Milan on Saturday was not a dream performance of the kind that will go into the history of the game, at least not with regard to picturesque dribbling or wonderful skill. Nevertheless, for me it was one of the most beautiful games I have ever witnessed. Don’t get me wrong, I have very fond memories of breathtaking performances and huge victories of the past; against Real Madrid in the CL for instance, and of course the 6-1 thrashing of Milan at San Siro in 1997, but I seem to have something of a masochistic tendency in preferring the wins that are intense and nerve wrecking over the crushing and illustrious ones.

It must be because victory tastes so much sweeter after really having had to put in an effort. And I’m not just talking about the players here. As a supporter, the Epic Battle of Milan, 2010 AD made me sweat, clench my fists, grind my teeth and smoke an excessive number of cigarettes (which, incidentally, is no mean feat while grinding one’s teeth!) as I watched the screen with misty eyes and a pounding heart for the entire match. It was so intense that as the final whistle was finally blown after an eternity of added time, I well nigh shed a tear out of pure relief and suppressed emotionality.

Being in a bar full of people however, I opted for the old punch-the-wall-with-delight routine instead, but inside, the somewhat irrational sense of pride and accomplishment filled my chest and a stream of happiness and fulfilment beyond compare flowed through my veins (I am sometimes rather glad my girlfriend is too disinterested and my son too young to read these posts!).

But why did I feel such pride and joy? After all, I didn’t do much to affect the game (nothing that can be proven scientifically, anyway) and any credit should rightly and exclusively go to the team, supporters and staff present at the San Siro. Well, I think it has to do with a rather strange phenomenon in this modern age; the feeling of a bond between myself and the mythical-factual entity called Juventus F.C.

A while back, we discussed here at Pondering Calcio the fact that in relation to football, you seem to sometimes hold the exact opposite views than in the ‘real’, political world, and here is yet another example of this: In relation to club allegiance, I can be fired up in an almost fascist-like manner. I pound my chest, ready myself for battle and feel a deeply rooted adherence to the Juventus cause. A feeling, I suspect, very close to the one generated in Germany in the thirties by the Blut und Boden rhetoric of the Nazi party, only here – luckily – restricted to the mental approach to a game of football.

This feeling is, as is well-documented over the years, in some cases a dangerous one – and one that once in a while needs to be reflected upon lest it takes an intolerant or even violent turn.

That said, the feeling of belonging to something, of fighting for it and believing it in spite of ‘the others’ is probably something very thoroughly ingrained in our species, and the modern-day ways of dealing with this desire to be part of something bigger than oneself is to join various clubs or movements, be they political, religious or ‘simply’ a football team. I at some point in my formative years chose the latter option – for better or worse. For it is not all rosy being a devoted fan.

I consider myself a loyal supporter and have stood by my team through ups and downs for twenty-odd years, defending the club, as it were, against its ‘enemies’ and the general lack of appreciation in the world of football. And because of this, I feel that I do play a small part in the successes of the club.

Maybe this is because Juve was in dire straits when I came to like Her, and it has been natural for me to think of Juventus as kind of an underdog that needs my support – even though The Old Lady is the most successful team in Italy. In any case it is a curious fact that I seem to feel my association with the club the strongest when she’s not leading the pack. I do love the wins and I hate to lose as much as anyone, but the fact of the matter is that despite the immense success of the team in the decade between 1995 and 2005, I have been the most involved with the club from 1990-1994 and post-calciopoli.

Why this is so is anyone’s guess, but I must somehow thrive with obstacles. I simply adore winning after being through hard times and suffering humiliation. It’s got to do with spite and maybe some
amount of schadenfreude on behalf of ‘the others’, I guess. That’s how I felt on Saturday, anyway.

Maybe a more universal example of such a glorious feeling of beating the whole world against the odds arrived with Italy’s victory at the 2006 WC. A lot of you folks might get what I mean if you cast your mind back to that occasion. But there’s still something missing in that analogy, ‘cause while Lippi had a mature and strong team of world-class stars, Saturday’s Juve team, apart from being a work-in-progress to begin with, was haunted by injuries and the suspension of their most in-form player and thus could only really rely on their attitude.

It’s not hard beating the best when you have a great team. The tricky part is doing it with a lesser side. What happened Saturday night at the San Siro was not a question of the best players outplaying the opponent with their skill and individual brilliance, but one of a team so possessed to win that the sheer grit and tenacity practically formed a wall on the pitch. And in some weird way, I felt I was part of this, as if the grinta of the Juventus XI stemmed from the collective will of the thousands of fans of the Juventus Diaspora. It certainly felt that way, and that is what made this victory so very special to me.

Such powerful experiences are unachievable, I think, without having been through the downs as well. And this is one of the reasons I sometimes find it a bit harder to respect a fan of the
perpetually winning Barcelona side as a true fan than one of, say, Newcastle or Napoli. Which I’m sure is extremely unfair to the loyal Barcelona supporter. Maybe I should in stead feel sorry for him for not experiencing the full richness of the game?

Anyway, the sheer forcefulness of such transcendent emotions experienced during a ‘special game’ like the one on Saturday is perhaps also the main reason why it is ever so important to keep sports aside from politics (eh, Berlusconi?).

It certainly can be overwhelming at times, but then again; for me this is the real reason why I continue to spend so much of my life watching football matches.

People often speak of the magic performances of beautiful trickery and fireworks of Messi or Cassano but I think that behind these cheap tricks, there lies a more complex and arcane type of football magic, namely the enchantment generated by the passion of the supporters, which is associated with the darker forces in human nature as well as the most beautiful traits of our race – and therefore much richer and deeper than the shallow tricks. This sort of magic thrives in Italian football due to the very culture surrounding the game.

The furbizia on and off the field is the (sometimes) visible expression of this notion that football is more than a sport and unfolds beyond the pitch as well, involving many actors aside from the players – including the tifosi, the moneymen and the Gods of football and fortune. This is not all good, obviously, but it’s certainly thrilling and it adds an extra element to Calcio, when compared to more pragmatic approaches to the game elsewhere.

This ‘magic’ injects a passion and ignition into some games that is unseen (or rather; ‘unfelt’) anywhere else in the world, at least in my experience, and I believe that it plays a big part in the unique attraction of Italian football.

Rarely has such an enchanted atmosphere been more present than at the Giuseppe Meazza Saturday night. And it arose, mind you, not from violent animosity between the clubs and fans but from the utter significance of the game itself – and the magic surrounding it.

Thank you to Ali Brohi and PanArmenian for the wonderful photos. Remember to check these guys out at flickr.