Leicester City v Real Madrid

Leicester City outfoxed by Real Madrid 

Leicester City 1 - 2 Real Madrid (30-07-11)

nPower Challenge Cup

A warm EFW welcome to writer, artist, thinking women's Justin Bieber and Leicester City fan, Ryan Hubbard...

Did you know that Leicester has a Statue of Liberty? If you're from Leicester you probably do, but if you're not, I have a photo to prove it.

See, told you...

Originally erected in the 1920's, it sat on top of a local shoe factory named Liberty Shoes, but when the factory closed, the building and statue fell into disrepair. When the old factory was demolished to make way for more Student Accommodation, the statue disappeared. That was until 2008, when the City Council found it in a scrapyard, and erected a plinth for it on a traffic island just a stones' throw away from it's original location, greeting visitors to the city.

In my 23 (okay, okay. Almost 24) years on this Earth, I have been lucky enough to see many famous sights. The Colosseum in Rome, The Pyramids of Giza, La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona; they all rank as some of my favourites. But none come close to Leicester's Statue of Liberty. When you walk along Upperton Road on a match-day, and you see Lady Liberty's crown peer from behind the crest of the road, you could be forgiven for mistaking her for the original; sitting on her island pedestal and surrounded by a deep blue sea. But rather than the water of the New York Harbour, this is an ocean of Leicester City shirts slowly making their way over the River Soar, and around the corner onto Eastern Boulevard; ready to be greeted by the wonderful sight of the Walkers, er... I mean King Power Stadium in the distance.

Saturday's game at the newly-titled stadium may have only been a friendly, but it's the annual curtain-raiser at Filbert Way – a sort of tradition at many clubs. In 2002, Athletic Bilbao opened the Walkers Stadium with a 1-1 draw, and the following season it was Frank Rijkaard's Barcelona (complete with Valdez, Puyol, Xavi, Ronaldinho and Kluivert) who claimed a 1-0 win in front of 32,000 in LE2. Since then however, the standard of opposition has been on a steady decline. Going from a pre-season tournament featuring RCD Mallorca, Maritimo and East Bengal in 2004, to last season's “massive” game against Sunderland, much wasn't expected from the Foxes' faithful this season. But towards the end of the season, rumours began to float around that Leicester's Thai owners had planned a dress-rehearsal of the 2014 Champions League final (yeah, go on - laugh now) to open our 2011/12 campaign; and it turned out to be true. Real Madrid; the ones with Mourinho, Ronaldo, Ozil, and all them other players you see on the telly, were actually coming to Leicester!

This game caps off a rather surreal year for Leicester fans, starting off in October as Paolo Sousa was relieved of his position following a disastrous start to the league campaign. Imagine the shock when, upon switching to Sky Sports News expecting us to be linked with the usual suspects in Iain Dowie and Chris Coleman; seeing the headline “Leicester City have unveiled Sven Goran Eriksson as their new manager”. Then just a few weeks later, looking on through a dodgy internet stream as your team take on – and beat – the Thailand national team in Bangkok. Then how about seeing photographs of your club's latest retail outlet, in the Thai Capital's Suvarnabhumi Airport. And how about seeing this? Certainly makes a change from the previous years of being known for setting off fire extinguishers and rape allegations at Le Manga.

A 5:15pm kick-off - probably due to some television scheduling in the Far East - meant that there was plenty of time beforehand to sample a few sangrias (or rather Carlsberg and Cider) in the local cafés (pubs); and with a gloriously Iberian-style Summer day combined with all of the Real shirts floating around town, you could have been mistaken for thinking that you actually were in the Spanish capital. Although many of the Los Blancos shirt-wearing fans could probably speak as much Spanish as I can speak Swahili.

After a few “confidence pints”, a rendition of “When You're Smiling”, and a pub burger and chips in the city centre, the walk to the stadium soon switched to discussions on topics such as “How many Paul Gallagher was going to stick past Iker Casillas?”, and “How long until Matt Mills flattens Cristiano Ronaldo?”. Turns out that we weren't going to get an answer to either as when, checking Twitter for updates on the walk to the ground, we found that neither the Portuguese or the Spaniard were in the starting line-up. However, José Mourinho had placed Kaká, Karim Benzema, Fabio Coentrao and captain Sergio Ramos in his first-choice eleven – a by-far stronger line-up than Sven Goran Eriksson is going to have to combat in the Championship this season.

Can we just borrow a few for the first half?

A quick attempt to buy a programme (I later found out they had sold-out fifteen minutes before I had even arrived), and a quick trip to empty out a couple-of pints of pear cider later, and we took our seats in the West Stand. We might as well have sat in an oven with someone shining a torch in my face. On a day where Hell had already seemingly frozen over (word had spread that Fernando Torres scored for Chelsea); you'd have thought it was someone in Leicester who'd made a weather-swapping deal with Lucifer himself.

As 15,000-or-so City fans began to regret not bringing a pair of shades (and a young couple a few rows behind began to regret their choice of wearing a Barcelona shirt), the players made their way from the tunnel to thunderous applause; and as soon as the game kicked-off, Leicester were predictably on the back-foot. However Choruses of “Barcelona and Madrid, they'll make a mighty bid; but they'll never beat Leicester any more” rang around the stadium and spurred the Foxes on. It might have been a little naïve, but I think those singing actually believed it. I believed it. I just couldn't see it unfold.

I'm not going to pretend I could see everything, the bright orange ball in the sky put pay to that. But I did see Matt Mills head-butt an advancing Real player's foot, and just minutes later give the same treatment to goalkeeper Antonio Adan's knee. Cue chants of “he's here, he's there, he's every-bleeping-where” aimed at the former Reading man.

I did manage to see a cool finish from José Callejon, after Benzema's trickery rounded Kasper Schmeichel. I also saw Benzema get on the score-sheet himself, slotting home after Marcelo's strike hit the post.

I saw probably the most expensive substitute's bench ever assembled, cleared; as Cristiano Ronaldo, Xabi Alonso, Iker Casillas and Mesut Ozil made their way onto the hallowed KP Stadium turf.

Ronaldo: "Nobody told me Darius Vassell was playing!!!"

I then saw the Leicester goalkeeper go on to make star-jump saves that even his father would have been proud of. And with two minutes remaining, I then saw the thing that over thirty-two thousand had waited to see...

A long throw-in, flicked on by Sol [Sol] Bamba, was met by the left boot of Lloyd Dyer. 15 yards out, Dyer smashed it past the rooted Casillas and into the bottom left corner. Leicester City had scored against Real Madrid.

As much as we'd said we'd beat them, we knew it was never a possibility. I think most would have settled for keeping the deficit to less than three goals. But we'd scored against Real Madrid.

Don't drop this one Sergio!

As Sergio Ramos lifted the nPower Challenge Cup, the 32,118 began to make their way back down Eastern Boulevard and passed by Lady Liberty again. “E-I-E-I-E-I-O” the crowd sang; “Up the Football League we go”. A celebration of football it certainly was. I think I even saw Cristiano Ronaldo celebrating with a Pukka Pie. I don't accept cheques, Danny.

For the record: I promised Mr Hubbard a large stash of used fivers if he photographed Ronaldo in Leicester High Street eating a Pukka Pie. And he only went and did it....

PHOTO CREDITS: Gareth Lloyd (@El_Lloydie) and Ryan Hubbard (@Ryan_Hubbard)

Ryan is the Editor of  both Modern Football and Los Revolucionarios. 

Manchester City v Leicester City

Meditation's what you need

Manchester City 4-2 Leicester City (18:01:11)

I'm delighted to welcome David Bevan from The Seventy Two back to European Football Weekends. As a fan of the Foxes, he's still coming to terms with the Thai-kover at Leicester City as well as pondering a conversion to Buddhism. What would "the awakened one" make of this Cup Thai at Eastlands between City and, erm, City:

For most football writers, the meeting of Manchester City and Leicester City in the FA Cup third round provided an opportunity to tell the tale of an age-old friendship between Roberto Mancini and Sven-Goran Eriksson. Fair enough. Their time together at both Sampdoria and Lazio certainly provided an interesting background to proceedings. But there was a distinctly Eastern flavour to the events over the past four years that reunited Mancini and Eriksson.

In early 2007, Mancini was in the midst of a successful spell as coach of Internazionale and Eriksson was still plotting his next move following his departure from the post of England manager after the 2006 World Cup. To cut a long story short, the former Prime Minister of Thailand, Thaksin Shinawatra, led a takeover at Manchester City and brought Eriksson to the club, setting in motion the timeline of heavy investment that would eventually make possible the appointment of Mancini by City's current owners in December 2009.

The Thai influence at Leicester City is more current. Less than twelve months ago, there had never been any connection between Thailand and Leicester City. Fast forward to the present day and Leicester's takeover by the King Power Group has already resulted in a trip to the country to face the Thai national team in a mid-season friendly, while holidays to Thailand are currently being dished out during half time at every Leicester home game.

And so, in an FA Cup draw that made this particular correspondent yearn for the days of Bert Millichip's velvet bags, both Noel Gallagher and Serge from Kasabian plucked balls representing the teams they support from a slow-motion food processor and Mancini and Eriksson were back together for one evening only.

Well, two in fact. Because Mancini willingly fielded Jo and Shaun Wright-Phillips in the 2-2 draw at the Walkers Stadium, before ditching both for the replay in favour of players with a sensible quantity of letters on the back of their shirts - the ultimate compliment to a Leicester side that more than matched their wealthy visitors for the entirety of the match. Andy King's opportunistic equaliser demanded an afternoon of annual leave be taken for the midweek trip up the M6 to Manchester.

I've also been influenced by the East in recent times, to such a degree that a seemingly straightforward cup tie against a Premier League team could not be given such little thought. For the last eighteen months or so, I've been toying with the exploration of Buddhism. It's currently a mere flirtation with qualities that I have begun to admire in my brother, who has turned his life from something which was heading inexorably for drug-fuelled disaster into a rather enviable existence managing a small cafe with few cares in the world. While I can't imagine ever admitting that football doesn't matter, it has certainly made me look at the game in a different way. Or try to, at least.

The good, then.

Attempting to remain objective, which is a hell of a lot easier after sleeping on it, paying fifteen quid to watch world-class players like David Silva and Carlos Tevez was a privilege. The recent saga over Tevez's possible departure left a nasty taste in the mouth but the challenge he offered to Jack Hobbs and Souleymane Bamba was a useful exercise for Leicester's new partnership at the back. Because, after all, the league is the priority and always will be. If Leicester can learn from their two outings against some of the world's best, it will benefit the intended assault on the play-off places over the second half of the season.

I also enjoyed visiting Eastlands. You can call it our big day out, our cup final, our highlight of the season - whatever you call it, it is essentially enjoyable purely because it is a break from the norm. When you've spent the best part of eight years having to make an annual trip to places like the Ricoh Arena, rocking up somewhere like the City of Manchester Stadium makes for a nice change as much as anything else. Personally, I'd have preferred going somewhere like Hereford or Peterborough but Manchester City away was an acceptable alternative.

And then there were our two goals, of course. The first was a dubious penalty won by one of Lloyd Dyer's numerous scampering darts into the area. Paul Gallagher's now customary spot kick style even merited a Twitter comment from Arsenal captain Cesc Fabregas, who came off the bench the following night at Elland Road and enjoyed a similar effect to his compatriot Silva. Fabregas also commented on Leicester's "impressive" start to the game and that we were taking the game to our lofty opponents. Cheers, Cesc. Always liked your work. Gally smashed the ball past Joe Hart to level the scores, Tevez having fired an excellent opener in past Chris Weale at our end. Decent celebrations from the 6,000 Leicester fans and, thankfully, a goal to savour from our lengthy trip.

The hosts then scored twice in the space of two minutes to head into half time with a comfortable lead, a Patrick Vieira tap-in and Adam Johnson's cool finish making life extremely difficult for us. We kept the lead down to two until deep into the second half when Tevez's clever off-the-ball running won a penalty and the tie looked all over when he stepped up to take it. Improbably, Weale made a save with his legs and Dyer then cut the deficit when he ran onto a superb pass from Yuki Abe and slotted past Hart. Aleksander Kolarov eventually wrapped things up for the home side with a long-range shot in injury time.

It had taken over three hours of football to definitively separate the sides and most right-minded Leicester fans stayed to applaud our players off the pitch. A few buggered off, as was their prerogative. I tried to selectively clap most of our lot, with the now traditional pause for Matt Oakley. Should have taken out Tevez in the buildup for their fourth, but chose to trot obediently alongside him instead and, five seconds later, we lost out on the chance of a grandstand finish.

I kicked the seat in front of me in frustration. Ah yes, Buddhism.

Every game these days, I'm trying really hard to look at the bigger picture. Someone's got to go home disappointed, so it's only right that it's not the opposition every time. We're forking out a big wedge for players as a result of our Thai-keover (oh yes!) in the same way that Manchester City are supposedly attempting to buy a title. Why should I get annoyed with Yaya Toure's £200,000-per-week salary accounting for my team's FA Cup dream? We're effectively doing the same at a lower level by chucking tens of thousands of pounds at Yakubu to try to beat Doncaster and Scunthorpe. And that's the unease that's eating away at me as I try to support my club's promotion push. I enjoyed travelling to Yeovil and Carlisle a couple of years ago. The supposed lure of the Emirates and Stamford Bridge cannot match my desire to return to Leyton Orient. It helped that we won at most of these places, admittedly.

Regardless of how I feel about what is currently happening to my club, I defy anyone raised on "the wonder and terror of soccer", as Run of Play so beautifully puts it, to distance themselves from all partisan leanings. It's bastard impossible. Two days later, I will quite happily admit that Manchester City deserved their victory, that Silva and Tevez were a class apart, that Dyer dived, Mark Halsey was a key component of our second goal and some of our fans were complete idiots for singing Manchester United songs just because we were playing against their rivals (I know, I know...) But in that moment when Richie Wellens is squaring up to Tevez, I want Wellens to knock him out. And if he does, I'll berate the referee for sending him off. Or blame Tevez for provoking him. I've got an awful long way to go, haven't I?

I'm beginning to take an alternative tack with the whole Buddhism thing. I feel confident that I understand football is not important in the grand scheme of things. We can all take enjoyment from it to differing degrees but, as long as we retain that perspective, it should be fine to let out the odd cry of anguish when some bloke who will kiss four different badges in his career thumps a free kick straight out of play. It's a form of meditation. When things are going wrong off the pitch, you can lose yourself in what is happening on it for ninety minutes every once in a while. If you've got this far, you've lost yourself in my writing for a good five minutes or so. Another ninety won't hurt this weekend. Try to just sit back and enjoy it if you can...

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