AEK - MILAN: 1-0. PWNED.
Sigh.
I don't know if I've ever been happier as a football fan. It was Tuesday, November 21st 2006. A date no one will ever forget. And I was there. AEK, with a budget roughly equivalent to one quarter of Kaka's market value, won. AEK beat AC Milan. And not for one minute did I believe we would lose (oh who am I kidding? I was shitting myself for the first 15 minutes. But after that? All 60.000 of us knew victory would be ours.).
This was just the second victory for AEK in the Champions League (not this season. We have 2 wins period. Aren't we awesome? Answer: YES.), but it means we now have a very good chance of advancing to the next stage. And, after experiencing one of the best nights of my life at the Athens Olympic Stadium, with an atmosphere so festive and with love in the air, I decided to do an AEK picspam to honour this unique occasion.
A little teaser:
The Athens Olympic Stadium. Full of AEK fans who didn't stop singing for a minute.
I was a beautiful game. AEK, a team with only a few experienced players and many hopeful and very talented youngsters (much like Arsenal, my other love), didn't even flinch: we faced Maldini, Kaka, Pirlo and Inzaghi as if they were, well, just another bunch of footballers. And Milan was just another team. Not once did we show fear, not once did we lose faith, not once did we stop to think what we were on the verge of achieving. Victory over AC Milan, one of the greatest football clubs of all time (admittedly not at their best right now, but still: logic would dictate that a less than fully fit Milan shouldn't have trouble beating a team like AEK Athens, no matter what.).
A quick round-up of the game (mini football rant! Sorry, I have to.):
the first 15 minutes were crazy. Milan went in the game obviously wishing to get an early goal, and if it weren't for our brilliant Italian keeper Stefano Sorrentino they would have. Inzaghi missed a sitter (what a surprise), our keeper managed to hold Milan off fighting tooth and nail, and we got through those 15 first minutes unscathed. Then, it was as though a light flickered on. The players saw that the ball just wouldn't go in for Milan and, with the guidance of our BRILLIANT Spanish manager, Llorenç Serra Ferrer, as well a little help from us, the 60.000 fans, they decided they'd just go for it. Why the hell not?
The game was quite balanced for about another 10 minutes, and it was in the 32' minute that AEK was awarded a freekick. Our resident freekick specialist, the Brazilian Julio Cesar struck the ball ever so awesomely and we scored:
Sigh. You can hear a bit of Greek in this clip, and you can also hear the crowd going crazy. I've never experienced anything like this in all the years I've been going to the Olympic Stadium. It was one of those nights. In this clip you can hear the crowd a bit better, especially in random moments, when the ball was in the center of the field. We just sung.
The second half went by like it was 5 minutes. I found myself looking at the score board and, just like that, it said "80th minute". That's when we all believed. We watched the last 15 minutes of the game standing, shouting, singing, shaking. But we knew. We knew we'd win. And we did. I've never hugged so many strangers in my life (well, I've never really hugged a stranger before, but you know what I mean). I got home hours later still on a high.
So here's a picspam to thank our players, to honour the occasion, to have something to remember this by, to praise my team for never giving up and for believing.
My boys before kick-off:
Left to right:
Our captain Traianos Dellas (you might remember him from when Greece won the Euro), our resident Hungarian pretty boy Dániel Tőzsér, our Italian keeper Stefano Sorrentino, our fugly yet kickass Italian defender (Sexy) Bruno Cirillo (he really is known as "Sexy Bruno". I'll elaborate later on. Seriously.), our 18 year-old boy wonder Stelios Papastathopoulos, our sophisticated leader Akis Zikos, our AWESOME ZOMG Brasilian Gustavo Manduca, our other awesome Brasilian with great hair Emerson Moisés Costa (or "Emo"), our other other awesome Brazilian with no hair Julio Cesar and our random and slightly useless defender Stavros Tziortziopoulos. Yes, I realise these are 10 players. The eleventh player is out of frame. He is Nikos Lyberopoulos, and we love him more than words can say:
(he can be seen here hugging our goalscorer Cesar. Just ignore Sexy Bruno on the right. He can also be seen scoring goals like crazy for the Greek National team. Because he's that good.)
Here's our pretty boy (known as "the Hungarian David Beckham, bless) yawning as he's entering the pitch. Ahem.
Here's our MAGNIFICENT manager with Milan's manager, Carlo Ancelotti before the game:
(erm, he's the short old bald guy. The saying "more than meets the eye" has never been more appropriate)
Serra has worked at Barcelona among other teams and he's one of the smartest and most confident people I've ever seen. He reminds me of my love, Arsene Wenger. Only (much) shorter. And grandfatherly. And cuddlier! ♥ Really, everything AEK has achieved this year is because of him. He's a true winner and he never minces words. He has a vision, as he usually says, for AEK and we're getting there step by step. Also he, unlike Rafa Benitez, knows how to make rotation work.
Here are the two captains before kick-off, Dellas and Grandpa Paolo Maldini:
Dellas is from the island of Rhodes, and due to his height (which is obvious in this picture, remember Maldini is very tall as well) he is known as "The Colossus".
Here's what happened right before the game started, when we all waved our flags and threw confetti to create what was a true hurricane of awesomeness:
*random*
AEK's victory was like Christmas come early:
Here's Sorre, our keeper, saving perhaps Inzaghi's (and Milan's) best chance:
Here's Sorre interacting with the crowd after his save:
(he almost left us last year, and he'll probably leave us in the summer, for Milan no less, but he loves the fans and he never hesitates to show it. He's always the first to applaud us and he's always gesturing and waving at us.)
Here's another pic of Sorre, just because:
(sure, he has a case of the thunder thighs. We love him anyway.)
Here's Paolo Maldini with Lybe:
The voluminous hair didn't help Maldini win. It just cushioned the blow of the ball when he attempted to head it.
Two words:
GUSTAVO MANDUCA, bitchez:
Gustavo came to AEK as part of a trade of another player (Katsouranis, who went to Benfica), and he was basically a cast-off whom we all considered useless. Well, we were wrong. He is AWESOME. He's so awesome that a priest actually waited for him outside the locker room after the game so he could get his autograph. And, presumably, give him his blessing.
Another one of Manduca, because at first we all considered him a joke (and it must have been hard on him to hear all of the fans and papers say "why the hell was this guy brought on?"), but he managed to win us all over by his sheer dedication.
Adorkable.
Here's Inzaghi missing yet another goal opportunity. But that's not important. Notice AEK's young player on the right:
The future of Greek football: Stelios Papastathopoulos. He's 18 and he's very reminiscent of Philippe Senderos. Impossibly mature for his age, with guts to spare and absolutely calm and fearless. Interestingly enough, he's never played for us in the Greek league yet, he's only played in the Greek Cup and the Champions League.
Here's one of AEK's more famous players, the only Greek player to have ever played in a Champions League final (with Monaco, where he played for 4 years). Akis Zikos:
***Ahem. I don't think Oliveira appeciates Akis' attempt to molest him. Nor does the indignant Daniele Bonera.
Akis again. Oh, and an unknown player called "Kaka". Whatever.
This "Kaka" person was marked by several different AEK players over the course of the night:
***Here he is with Sexy Bruno (and people think Kaka is sexy. Ha.)
***Here he is with Zikos again. As if Akis would let you anywhere near that ball, Ricardo.
***Here he is with our very stylish Brazilian Emerson. Who has fantastic hair and the most hilarious English accent you will ever hear: it's a mix of a Portuguese and a Scottish accent (he played for Rangers for a while). It has to be heard to be believed.
Despite his various attempts to score, Kaka failed to do anything spectacular. And that made him sad, hah.. erm, I mean aw:
(I really had have nothing against Kaka. Except for the fact he actually came to Athens and in the press conference before the game he said he wished Lille would advance to the next stage of the Champions League instead of AEK. We were so hospitable and welcomed him to our stadium, and he flat-out said he wanted us to get knocked out of the CL. Thanks. How very polite.)
Andrea Pirlo (whom I worship and consider the best Italian player and one of the 3 best midfielders in the world) on the other hand was far more gracious, giving an interview for the official match programme and saying "AEK is a very good team with great fans who create a fantastic atmosphere in their stadium". I love you Andrea ♥ ♥ ♥
Here he is with our fugly awesome goalscorer. Also note that Pirlo played in the Athens Olympic Games in 2004 with the Italian Olympic Team (aw. I remember seeing him back then too in the Georgios Karaiskakis stadium. He is love.)
Perhaps my two favourite players on the pitch:
***Andrea and Ilias Kyriakidis. Our very own Cesc Fabregas (kind of. Well, not really. Mutatis mutandis. Anyway. Ahem.). He's only 21 years old (yet this is his third year on the team), very modest, levelheaded and he has such determination and passion for the game that he's able to change the flow of any given match as soon as he comes on. He might lack the spectacular technical skills but he has soul.
OK, goal time:
He shoots...
He scores!
Celebrations ensue:
Hail Cesar.
Choke Cesar.
Emo's face is about to crack from too much grinning, Papastathopoulos is out of focus (and is looking somewhere else, liek, WTF?), Cesar is clearly thinking "holy shit, I scored against Milan, WHOO HOO!", Manduca looks radiant with his glistening face and flopping hair and Bruno looks sexy as always.
Since I'm sure Bruno's immense fugliness has left you wondering why the hell we call him "Sexy Bruno", here's the explanation: in a derby with Panathinaikos last year Bruno got involved in a tackle that tore up his shorts. What was he wearing underneath his shorts? The skimpiest, tightest, tiniest underwear which would have been a thong had they been any smaller. The fans of course instantly picked up on it. Cue singing: "Seeeeexyyyy, Seeexyyy Bruuuunoooo....". Now it's all we sing when he makes a good tackle. Even if he looks like this:
Hot. (look at the fans behind him with their flags. JOY.)
Back to celebrations:
Yay!
Yay!
Yay!
(I could go on "yay-ing!", but I won't).
I must also say that in the second half Milan's goalkeeper Dida got injured while making an amazing save and he had to be sunstituted. The entire stadium got up and applauded him until he was out of the pitch. That's class for you. And respect for a great player.
So, that about sums it up.
Wait, actually, this does:
Yay! (I couldn't help it).
I felt I really had to do this. It only makes sense to me, but it came from my heart. There are many players missing because it's not the easiest thing to find good quality pictures of obscure Greek players (not all of whom played in the game against Milan, but all of whom have made a huge contribution to AEK's course so far), but I love them all the same. Speaking of finding pictures, I want to thank rebelstrike21 ♥ for letting me use the pictures marked with "***".
I leave you with this: as Nikos Lyberopoulos said, this was AEK's greatest victory until the next one.
I don't know if I've ever been happier as a football fan. It was Tuesday, November 21st 2006. A date no one will ever forget. And I was there. AEK, with a budget roughly equivalent to one quarter of Kaka's market value, won. AEK beat AC Milan. And not for one minute did I believe we would lose (oh who am I kidding? I was shitting myself for the first 15 minutes. But after that? All 60.000 of us knew victory would be ours.).
This was just the second victory for AEK in the Champions League (not this season. We have 2 wins period. Aren't we awesome? Answer: YES.), but it means we now have a very good chance of advancing to the next stage. And, after experiencing one of the best nights of my life at the Athens Olympic Stadium, with an atmosphere so festive and with love in the air, I decided to do an AEK picspam to honour this unique occasion.
A little teaser:
The Athens Olympic Stadium. Full of AEK fans who didn't stop singing for a minute.
I was a beautiful game. AEK, a team with only a few experienced players and many hopeful and very talented youngsters (much like Arsenal, my other love), didn't even flinch: we faced Maldini, Kaka, Pirlo and Inzaghi as if they were, well, just another bunch of footballers. And Milan was just another team. Not once did we show fear, not once did we lose faith, not once did we stop to think what we were on the verge of achieving. Victory over AC Milan, one of the greatest football clubs of all time (admittedly not at their best right now, but still: logic would dictate that a less than fully fit Milan shouldn't have trouble beating a team like AEK Athens, no matter what.).
A quick round-up of the game (mini football rant! Sorry, I have to.):
the first 15 minutes were crazy. Milan went in the game obviously wishing to get an early goal, and if it weren't for our brilliant Italian keeper Stefano Sorrentino they would have. Inzaghi missed a sitter (what a surprise), our keeper managed to hold Milan off fighting tooth and nail, and we got through those 15 first minutes unscathed. Then, it was as though a light flickered on. The players saw that the ball just wouldn't go in for Milan and, with the guidance of our BRILLIANT Spanish manager, Llorenç Serra Ferrer, as well a little help from us, the 60.000 fans, they decided they'd just go for it. Why the hell not?
The game was quite balanced for about another 10 minutes, and it was in the 32' minute that AEK was awarded a freekick. Our resident freekick specialist, the Brazilian Julio Cesar struck the ball ever so awesomely and we scored:
Click to viewSigh. You can hear a bit of Greek in this clip, and you can also hear the crowd going crazy. I've never experienced anything like this in all the years I've been going to the Olympic Stadium. It was one of those nights. In this clip you can hear the crowd a bit better, especially in random moments, when the ball was in the center of the field. We just sung.
The second half went by like it was 5 minutes. I found myself looking at the score board and, just like that, it said "80th minute". That's when we all believed. We watched the last 15 minutes of the game standing, shouting, singing, shaking. But we knew. We knew we'd win. And we did. I've never hugged so many strangers in my life (well, I've never really hugged a stranger before, but you know what I mean). I got home hours later still on a high.
So here's a picspam to thank our players, to honour the occasion, to have something to remember this by, to praise my team for never giving up and for believing.
My boys before kick-off:
Left to right:
Our captain Traianos Dellas (you might remember him from when Greece won the Euro), our resident Hungarian pretty boy Dániel Tőzsér, our Italian keeper Stefano Sorrentino, our fugly yet kickass Italian defender (Sexy) Bruno Cirillo (he really is known as "Sexy Bruno". I'll elaborate later on. Seriously.), our 18 year-old boy wonder Stelios Papastathopoulos, our sophisticated leader Akis Zikos, our AWESOME ZOMG Brasilian Gustavo Manduca, our other awesome Brasilian with great hair Emerson Moisés Costa (or "Emo"), our other other awesome Brazilian with no hair Julio Cesar and our random and slightly useless defender Stavros Tziortziopoulos. Yes, I realise these are 10 players. The eleventh player is out of frame. He is Nikos Lyberopoulos, and we love him more than words can say:
(he can be seen here hugging our goalscorer Cesar. Just ignore Sexy Bruno on the right. He can also be seen scoring goals like crazy for the Greek National team. Because he's that good.)
Here's our pretty boy (known as "the Hungarian David Beckham, bless) yawning as he's entering the pitch. Ahem.
Here's our MAGNIFICENT manager with Milan's manager, Carlo Ancelotti before the game:
(erm, he's the short old bald guy. The saying "more than meets the eye" has never been more appropriate)
Serra has worked at Barcelona among other teams and he's one of the smartest and most confident people I've ever seen. He reminds me of my love, Arsene Wenger. Only (much) shorter. And grandfatherly. And cuddlier! ♥ Really, everything AEK has achieved this year is because of him. He's a true winner and he never minces words. He has a vision, as he usually says, for AEK and we're getting there step by step. Also he, unlike Rafa Benitez, knows how to make rotation work.
Here are the two captains before kick-off, Dellas and Grandpa Paolo Maldini:
Dellas is from the island of Rhodes, and due to his height (which is obvious in this picture, remember Maldini is very tall as well) he is known as "The Colossus".
Here's what happened right before the game started, when we all waved our flags and threw confetti to create what was a true hurricane of awesomeness:
*random*
AEK's victory was like Christmas come early:
Here's Sorre, our keeper, saving perhaps Inzaghi's (and Milan's) best chance:
Here's Sorre interacting with the crowd after his save:
(he almost left us last year, and he'll probably leave us in the summer, for Milan no less, but he loves the fans and he never hesitates to show it. He's always the first to applaud us and he's always gesturing and waving at us.)
Here's another pic of Sorre, just because:
(sure, he has a case of the thunder thighs. We love him anyway.)
Here's Paolo Maldini with Lybe:
The voluminous hair didn't help Maldini win. It just cushioned the blow of the ball when he attempted to head it.
Two words:
GUSTAVO MANDUCA, bitchez:
Gustavo came to AEK as part of a trade of another player (Katsouranis, who went to Benfica), and he was basically a cast-off whom we all considered useless. Well, we were wrong. He is AWESOME. He's so awesome that a priest actually waited for him outside the locker room after the game so he could get his autograph. And, presumably, give him his blessing.
Another one of Manduca, because at first we all considered him a joke (and it must have been hard on him to hear all of the fans and papers say "why the hell was this guy brought on?"), but he managed to win us all over by his sheer dedication.
Adorkable.
Here's Inzaghi missing yet another goal opportunity. But that's not important. Notice AEK's young player on the right:
The future of Greek football: Stelios Papastathopoulos. He's 18 and he's very reminiscent of Philippe Senderos. Impossibly mature for his age, with guts to spare and absolutely calm and fearless. Interestingly enough, he's never played for us in the Greek league yet, he's only played in the Greek Cup and the Champions League.
Here's one of AEK's more famous players, the only Greek player to have ever played in a Champions League final (with Monaco, where he played for 4 years). Akis Zikos:
***Ahem. I don't think Oliveira appeciates Akis' attempt to molest him. Nor does the indignant Daniele Bonera.
Akis again. Oh, and an unknown player called "Kaka". Whatever.
This "Kaka" person was marked by several different AEK players over the course of the night:
***Here he is with Sexy Bruno (and people think Kaka is sexy. Ha.)
***Here he is with Zikos again. As if Akis would let you anywhere near that ball, Ricardo.
***Here he is with our very stylish Brazilian Emerson. Who has fantastic hair and the most hilarious English accent you will ever hear: it's a mix of a Portuguese and a Scottish accent (he played for Rangers for a while). It has to be heard to be believed.
Despite his various attempts to score, Kaka failed to do anything spectacular. And that made him sad, hah.. erm, I mean aw:
(I really had have nothing against Kaka. Except for the fact he actually came to Athens and in the press conference before the game he said he wished Lille would advance to the next stage of the Champions League instead of AEK. We were so hospitable and welcomed him to our stadium, and he flat-out said he wanted us to get knocked out of the CL. Thanks. How very polite.)
Andrea Pirlo (whom I worship and consider the best Italian player and one of the 3 best midfielders in the world) on the other hand was far more gracious, giving an interview for the official match programme and saying "AEK is a very good team with great fans who create a fantastic atmosphere in their stadium". I love you Andrea ♥ ♥ ♥
Here he is with our fugly awesome goalscorer. Also note that Pirlo played in the Athens Olympic Games in 2004 with the Italian Olympic Team (aw. I remember seeing him back then too in the Georgios Karaiskakis stadium. He is love.)
Perhaps my two favourite players on the pitch:
***Andrea and Ilias Kyriakidis. Our very own Cesc Fabregas (kind of. Well, not really. Mutatis mutandis. Anyway. Ahem.). He's only 21 years old (yet this is his third year on the team), very modest, levelheaded and he has such determination and passion for the game that he's able to change the flow of any given match as soon as he comes on. He might lack the spectacular technical skills but he has soul.
OK, goal time:
He shoots...
He scores!
Celebrations ensue:
Hail Cesar.
Choke Cesar.
Emo's face is about to crack from too much grinning, Papastathopoulos is out of focus (and is looking somewhere else, liek, WTF?), Cesar is clearly thinking "holy shit, I scored against Milan, WHOO HOO!", Manduca looks radiant with his glistening face and flopping hair and Bruno looks sexy as always.
Since I'm sure Bruno's immense fugliness has left you wondering why the hell we call him "Sexy Bruno", here's the explanation: in a derby with Panathinaikos last year Bruno got involved in a tackle that tore up his shorts. What was he wearing underneath his shorts? The skimpiest, tightest, tiniest underwear which would have been a thong had they been any smaller. The fans of course instantly picked up on it. Cue singing: "Seeeeexyyyy, Seeexyyy Bruuuunoooo....". Now it's all we sing when he makes a good tackle. Even if he looks like this:
Hot. (look at the fans behind him with their flags. JOY.)
Back to celebrations:
Yay!
Yay!
Yay!
(I could go on "yay-ing!", but I won't).
I must also say that in the second half Milan's goalkeeper Dida got injured while making an amazing save and he had to be sunstituted. The entire stadium got up and applauded him until he was out of the pitch. That's class for you. And respect for a great player.
So, that about sums it up.
Wait, actually, this does:
Yay! (I couldn't help it).
I felt I really had to do this. It only makes sense to me, but it came from my heart. There are many players missing because it's not the easiest thing to find good quality pictures of obscure Greek players (not all of whom played in the game against Milan, but all of whom have made a huge contribution to AEK's course so far), but I love them all the same. Speaking of finding pictures, I want to thank rebelstrike21 ♥ for letting me use the pictures marked with "***".
I leave you with this: as Nikos Lyberopoulos said, this was AEK's greatest victory until the next one.