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Bid the muses home

Wednesday’s was United’s fourteenth visit to France, a country in which we have
lost three times (including the Super Cup final of 2008). Our only previous
visit to La Vélodrome, reputed as one of the most hostile venues outside Turkey,
was in the Autumn of 1999 when in a group match we suffered defeat to a William
Gallas toe poke.

In the early nineties l’OM had developed into one of the great club sides in
French history. In 1993 they became the only French club to be crowned European
Champions. Months later they were ruined in a bribery scandal and had their
nation’s championship taken and expunged from the record. Last season they
reclaimed this title.

We flew out of a cold and wet Manchester courtesy of a pilot whose main concern
seemed to be not to awaken the folk of Knutsford, into a brilliant spring
Mediterranean day, the Alps snow-topped on the horizon, below us the islands
from which Alexandre Dumas’ imprisonment inspired the Count of Monte Cristo
gleamed white in the sapphire sea. Marseille, founded by the ancient Greeks but
twinned with Glasgow; the birthplace of Petronius, Eric Cantona and Zinedine
Zidane and death place of Eric’s beloved muse Arthur Rimbaud.

The Champions League has resumed after its winter break and perhaps we dreamed
that United’s muse would return to inspire dormant creativity. Our first visit
to French soil resulted in the brilliant 5-0 demolition of Racing Club de
Strasbourg in the 1965 quarter final of the Inter Fairs Cities Cup. Dared we
hope for something even half as inspiring? What is man without his memories and
his dreams?

Perhaps it was the short coach trip and the slim, sexy courier. Perhaps it was
our escape from the cool, shaded side of the harbour and its Irish bars, teeming
with United fans supping their ale from nine in the morning, and the hundreds of
huge, leather-armoured gendarmes, macho-patrolling like extras out of Robocop or
Rollerball, twitching and itching to be wielding those batons.

Perhaps it was our quietstroll through the old quarter, the birthplace of Eric;
the streets are narrow and poor and decorated with elaborate graffiti but
there’s better exercise in the sunlight and the wind. I doubt if it was the
vast, echoing baroque cathedral or the oniomania which compelled me to buy a bar
of overpriced savon de Marseille to take home.

It might have had a lot to do with an afternoon sitting relaxed with Dennis in
the sunshine by the huge, yachted harbour, sipping the Chateau bottled local
appelation while at home the cold wet winds were ever blowing. Likely it was
also the champagne and smoked salmon and the beef Wellington for lunch, afloat
on La Nautique.

Perhaps it was getting to be in a bus which parked proximate to the stadium.
Perhaps it was the executive seats, high in the covered stand, or the
magnificent open bowl below us which even in the chilling February evening spoke
of a different, more relaxed Latin lifestyle. Perhaps it was the armies of OM
fans at either end, packed in the ground hours before the kick-off; the chanting
and foil-waving were encouraged over the loudspeakers but the passion with which
songs were exchanged and shared between North and South ends was inborn and the
pre-match atmosphere had an electricity touching on an ochlocracy long lost to
the Theatre of Oscitancy where the second leg will be played out.

Perhaps it was my chance at half time to remind Andy Cole of his magnificent
goal the last time these sides met at Old Trafford, or getting his autograph for
my grandson. Whatever it was, unlike everyone else it seems, Dennis and I came
away feeling we had had a decent day and watched a decent game. Not a classic
by any means but another rugged performance by Nemanja Vidi?, another cool and
commanding one by Chris Smalling, another display of unflappability from Edwin
van der Sar, a first half of pace and penetration from Nani and, save for a
fifteen minute period after half time which had to be survived, a commanding
team performance from United.

True, nothing much actually happened out there on the pitch. Each side mustered
two shots on target. At the start of the first half Nani’s free kick was headed
out to Darren Fletcher whose shot from the outside of the crowded area was only
just fielded by goalkeeper Steve Mandanda; a short while later Rooney’s
goalbound shot was blocked. Towards the end of the second Dimitar Berbatov very
nearly threaded a superb ball for Nani to slip in, but Mandanda just got there
first.

In between Gabriel Heinze, utterly outpaced and outwitted by Nani in the first
half had turned it around in the second and was prominent in l’OM’s good spell,
and a United midfield looking comfortable but devoid of invention had been
improved by the withdrawal of Darron Gibson and the introduction of Paul
Scholes. The referee was a German lawyer, more interested in ticking off Wayne
Rooney for dissent than dealing with Brandão’s elbow in Vidi?’s face, a wild
tackle by Scholes, Stéphane Mbia’s cynical but cleverly executed foul on Rooney
at the last gasp or the appearance on the pitch of several gifts, including a
golf ball, thrown at the United players.

Somehow the experience became less positive as the final whistle faded into
history and there was time to reflect. We had failed to secure an away goal.
United fans in their pen opposite had looked sparse in number and strangely
subdued in manner and this turned out to be partly due to their alleged
incarceration in a warehouse to provide baton practice for the Robocops. Some
United buses were held so long that our return flight did not leave until half
past two.

There were two or three people on our trip, unfortunately consistently within
earshot, who should not have travelled with the club and were whingeing about
the foreign food while two of their number (father and son) had managed to
achieve a first and get themselves ejected from the executive seats for fighting
(each other, I gather). My hand and calf were swollen and painful from a fall
in the stadium down a specially installed anti-English dangerous step.

Aware of the dangers of attempting a 250 mile drive after twenty four hours
awake I dosed myself with huge quantities of caffeine and still met with a fatal
accident. Honestly, officer, I was only doing seventy when in the Chiltern dawn
in the glare of my headlights I saw, standing in the middle of the M40 fast
lane, the long neck and brilliant blue head of a big bird. We each had a long
second to realise what was going to happen as he was paralysed in oblomovism and
I swear, just as in a cartoon, I saw him gulp. When I got home I found two
scaled feet sticking out where my radiator grill had once been. Sadly, he was a
beautiful bird, a large pheasant. A tragedy for the Buckinghamshire avian
community might be a London dinner, albeit an expensive one at £300 worth of
repairs..

Was his untimely death an omen? Our record following scoreless away first legs
is finely balanced. It has led to defeat on three occasions (Rotor Volgograd
1995, AS Monaco 1997 and Real Madrid in 2000) and victory in four (Sarajevo in
1967, PSV Eindhoven in 1984, PAE Athenaikos in 1991 and, of course, Barcelona in
2008). Each of them has provided an onerable second leg.

This tiredness is down to my obsession, this disappointment a risk we all take
spending time and money going to live sport. Our team could do with finding its
inspiration over the next few weeks. I never bade you go to Moscow or to Rome,
renounce that drudgery and bid the muses home.

Paul Andrew James