The sweet smell of success
It was the most tense football match I ever watched on television, with the possible exception of FC Porto vs Bayern Munich 16 years ago (I was eight then and I don't remember feeling this nervous). Our coach was forced to make two substitutions because of injuries, the Celtic players thought they were playing American football, and the referee didn't sanction half the fouls Celtic players did, and didn't show half the cards (he did sent off Baldé though, but it was on an already extreme situation). And despite all this we won. FC Porto is the UEFA Cup champion, thanks to a couple of goals from competition best scorer Derlei (45', 115') and Dmitri Alenichev (54'), the Russian who usually stays in the bench but got his place in the starting eleven alongside star midfielder Deco because of his incredible end-of-season performances. Celtic's Henrik Larsson made the best out of our defensive errors and tied the game twice (47', 57') immediately after our goals, but we finally got the winning goal on extra-time. We had a few beers, the tension settled, and a friend of ours had to honour his bet and ran down part of Boavista Av. towards the Bessa Stadium (our crosstown rivals' ground) wearing only a Porto kit and underpants while we celebrated. Now everyone's back home, and tomorrow will be a new ordinary day, as victories wear off more quickly than defeats. Well, now at least we have as many European Cups as Benfica. It's only a matter of time before we overtake them in every postive stat.···
