I have finally made it to the elusive 25 replies, and am able to create my own topic. I feel that for this initial post, I should really write about something profound and meaningful. Unfortunately, I don't posess the ability in penmanship to create anything epic, but I'm going to give it my best shot and write about my first experience of Anfield and about what being a Liverpool fan means to me now...
I was not born in Liverpool, I was born in the south. My family, all apart from my dad, are from the city and I have always felt a connection to the place. My dad, being a southerner (born in Croydon, attended University in Reading) naturally supports Manchester United, something that my brother follwed suit with much to my disgust. Having said that, this does at least make the matches between us a little more interesting (I drew 'Riise 18' on the back of his Mancherster United shirt with a permanent pen just ater Riise banged in that free kick at Anfield in 2001, although my mum did make me buy him a new one which at £35, was a lot of money for a 14 year old). It was left to my mum and aunts/uncles/various family members to teach me the Liverpool way, which I'll add, they did a good job with. As a result of having so much family in the city, I spent a lot of time coming up and visiting on a regular basis for birthdays/christmas/seeing my nan. It was on one such trip that I got to go to my first game at Anfield, Liverpool v Wimbledon in the Carling Premiership in the 1998/99 season, I would have been 12 i think.
Now, Liverpool v Wimbledon has never been, is not, and probably never will be the most mouthwatering of fixtures in a season, but it didnt matter to me in the slightest, I was so happy to be going to Anfield at last. At the time, it was common practice at school to gauge how much of a 'true fan' or alternatively, how much of a 'gloryhunter' you were to your team by how many times you had watched them play, and I was having to make do with a fake claim of having been on the stadium tour once, so I was looking forward it. Also adding to the experience was the fact that my brother had been on at me all season because 'United were going to do the treble', but he hadn't been to a match either yet, thus giving me the rights to claim that I was a 'true fan', even if we didn't win as much that season.
Everything about the match was better than I thought it was going to be. The Kop rising as one when an exciting passage of play occurs, the meaningful songs and chants (I've now been to games all over Europe and can say that to this day, they the best around), celebrating the goals (Berger, Riedle and Ince), the opposition of Robbie Earl and Carl Court. Ok, the last was a lie, they were both utter sh*te. At the end of the game Steve McManaman took a lap of honour as it was his last game for the club before going off to Real Madrid in Spain, and this was a touching moment for me as he was a particular favorite of mine, I even had a pet hamster called Macca. I left Anfield that day a very happy lad, singing the songs I'd heard all the way back to my aunt's housewith my uncle, safe in the knowledge I was now a 'truer fan' than I was before.
These days, I live in Liverpool and have so far managed to get to Anfield 5-6 times this season. Since I moved here, my passion and love for the club has intensified, if that was possible. Liverpool fans are different to any other set of fans in the world, there is a sense of pride, a close knit family feel between the fans. You can walk into a pub on matchday and talk to complete strangers about the club, something that is liable to get you a punch in other areas of the country. Our fans are knowlegable, we applaude good play by opposition teams and any goalkeeper playing in front of the Kop, something that you rarely see other teams do. Our fans are also the most dedicated in the world, how many other clubs have taken 60,000+ fans to a European Cup final, I don't know if i could name any. The single proudest moment of my Liverpool FC supporting career so far is the singing of You'll Never Walk Alone at half time in Istanbul. That for me sums up Liverpool fans better than I will ever be able to write down.
I'm know that was a little long winded, but I think it was better than writing my first post about random transfer speculation or something negative. I'm not entirely sure how to end this, but I've decided to go for this. I've noticed that in the past two weeks or so, there has been a bit of a negative vibe amongst fans. We all get frustrated from time to time, whether it be with the running of the club, managerial player selections or plain old bad results. One thing we all need to remember though is that we are Liverpool FC, we are proud, we are great, that form is temperary and class is permanent, and most importantly of all none of us will ever walk alone.
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