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The stars above us

A trip to the centrally heated Santiago Bernabéu Stadium seemed the perfect tonic for this miserable winter but sadly the only short flight I took was over the handlebars in Ashtead High Street on Saturday and after that and abdominal surgery on Tuesday I was watching with the countless millions on television, on Co-Codamol with the face of man who has passionately snogged a cheese grater, jealously receiving texts from Dennis and John in Chamartin waxing lyrical about the food and the wine.

Emerging from the clubs formed by returning Oxbridge students, Madrid Football Club were formed in 1902. They were first bestowed their royal title by King Alfonso XIII in 1920 and have grown to become the richest club in the world, the most successful in Europe. There are dark stories of the Franco years when the setter-up and puller-down of kings took away their title (and the King’s!) and Barcelona were thrashed amid stories of police intimidation. Real’s members have always owned and operated the club but the Real we would recognise today was developed by Santiago Bernabéu Yeste from the late forties.

This is the fifth occasion on which we have been drawn to play them. Our one success, of course, was the famous comeback in the semi-final of 1968 when all had seemed lost at half time and Matt Busby told the team just to go out and enjoy themselves. However, while the Busby Babes met their match in the semi-final of 1958 against Alfredo di Stefano and his famous team mates, our recovery in the latter stages of that second leg was sufficient to elicit the admiration of Busby by Bernabéu. He first offered him a job and then, after the air crash, ensured his club did all it could to help, particularly in a series of prestigious friendlies played for no stipulated fee.

The Spanish champions’ league form this season seems irrelevant when the two most famous clubs in the world are playing in front of eighty thousand Castilians with the weight of history upon them and a place in the European Cup quarter final at stake. For fans and players this privilege is what it is all about. United were lining up without Nemanja Vidi? but this would be a rite of passage for more than Jonny Evans, his replacement. Rafael da Silva, David de Gea, Phil Jones, Danny Welbeck all young men to be tested in the fire.

In 2003 we were sunk with three goals in half an hour; the idea this time was to survive the first quarter and go home still with a chance in the tie. The method, however, was old-fashioned. We attacked to make this a European Cup tie from the past, a thriller, a wondrous entertainment. Not that it was played entirely in the sporting atmosphere of fifties friendlies; Sergio Ramos, an old lag with twenty eight suspensions to his name, got Robin van Persie and Antonio Valencia booked with his play-acting, and the Spaniards were masters of the niggling foul. To dwell on such things, however, would be to cavil.

For a minute or two it was United who had the initiative but before long we were on the back foot and David de Gea made the first, and best, of his many saves, somehow seeing Fábio Coentrão’s shot through a forest of legs and fingertipping it onto the post. The main threat was from our old friend Cristiano Ronaldo and his partner Mesut Özil operating up the left; it took Rafael a while to learn how to cope. On the counter we were erroneously awarded a corner kick when van Persie headed forward for Shinji Kagawa. Wayne Rooney took it from the left and there was Welbeck, escaping Ramos, taking a couple of steps back and guiding a fine header home. There is no place on earth better to improve your record of one goal in twenty seven matches than the Bernabéu; 20 minutes 1-0.

The goal settled us and a fertile imagination could even discern from the body language of some of the home players signs of dismay. Unfortunately, Ángel di Maria, Ronaldo and ?zil seemed immune from this; de Gea smothered a near post effort from ?zil and touched the corner kick away. Michael Carrick fouled Ronaldo and although the wall held firm Ronaldo’s reflexes were such that he instantly shot the rebound; it went narrowly wide. From a throw on our right di María crossed and Ronaldo rose in a spectacularly graceful leap to head home. It would have made no difference (the Frenchman needed a hydraulic lift) but a token jump from Evra might have made us feel better; 30 minutes 1-1.

Van Persie nearly wriggled through and when Kagawa and he worked a cross from the left Welbeck was close to converting at the near post but Real took control again and we spent the rest of the half hanging in there. From Xabi Alonso’s long pass ?zil shot and de Gea saved at the near post; a sweeping move ended with ?zil crossing for Ronaldo but Jones just nicked it off his toes. Di Maria robbed van Persie and dribbled into the area and was bundled over by Jones; it looked horribly like a penalty. De Gea went down at the near post and held on with Karim Benzema at him; Ronaldo let fly a ferocious shot which scraped the bar. Ronaldo went to head Coentrão’s cross but Rio Ferdinand did just enough to put him off; somehow half time arrived with the scores level.

Immediately upon the resumption we were on the attack; a cross from van Persie which Welbeck all but headed home; Jones might have done more with the corner. Inevitably Real Madrid came back with a sustained assault; di Maria got the ball to Ronaldo who turned and shot sharply; de Gea saved. He brilliantly smothered Di Maria’s next shot but was beaten when the same player fired narrowly wide. Real brought on Gonzalo Higuaín and worked a move which left Sami Khedira to cross to the far post where Rooney, back helping Rafael, showed himself equally capable of being left for dead, this time by Coentrão; somehow de Gea kept it out, all flailing limbs like an angry airborne insect.

We were capable of high class football, too. Raphaël Varane had been a lucky boy when he got away with taking down Evra after a lovely Carrick move and we missed the best chance of the night; Rooney was suddenly away and releasing van Persie on his right, who hit the near post shot with venom; López managed to push it onto the post. Then di Maria, who had had a brilliant match, lobbed a suicidal pass back into the middle where Carrick intercepted with a lobbed header to put van Persie goalside and clear. He miscued and as the ball skewed crazily towards the open goal Alonso cleared it.

Ryan Giggs had come on and received a sporting ovation but Real established themselves outside our area and peppered it with shots which our defenders deflected, or Rio calmly obstructed; de Gea saved difficult ones from Khedira and Higuaín. Ronaldo put us all on edge with his decision to go for goal with a thirty five yard free kick; we remember those all too well. This one, thankfully, skimmed the bar with de Gea, our hero of the night, rooted to the spot. In added time substitute Luka Modri? centred and the ball came to Ronaldo, four yards out in the middle of the goal. Phil Jones refused to allow him to score.

Yet we could still have won it; a few minutes before the end Giggs and Evra passed their way up the left and for an instant the ball was there to be hit but Giggs chose a more difficult option. Then, in the last action van Persie won a free kick and took Jones’ pass, producing a smart strike across goal which López did very well to keep out of the goal.

What an evening! A throwback to the good old days when Santiago Bernabéu was among the small group of men who founded the European Cup, just so that you and I could watch the best football in Europe. The ITV statistics of twenty eight goal attempts by Real to twelve from United and twelve corners to eight, reflect accurately the excitement; add to that a series of superb saves by two of the most criticised goalkeepers in Europe.

Only on four previous occasions have United brought home a one-all first leg draw and none of them has resulted in failure though we pushed it close in 2008 against Olympique Lyonnais, scraping through with Ronaldo’s goal. Against AS St Etienne in 1977 we won the home leg comfortably at Home Park in Plymouth. It was another era altogether when Willem II and Djurgårdens IF were despatched with six goals in 1963 and 1964, Denis Law getting a hat trick each time. Perhaps a more reliable predictor is that all our ties against Real have been won by the club playing at home first, even in 2000 when we drew the first leg. There are certain to be more goals in this tie. It is the stars, the stars above us, govern our condition.

Paul Andrew James