Football Miracle Results

 I think one of the most wonderful things about football was the magic of seeing something incredible happen in front of you. There would be something interesting about seeing something that hasn't happened for X number of years happen. Maybe that would be the romance of football.

The downside of football is that when you've been a fan for long enough, you'd grow to realise that statistically, football “miracles” happen all the time. Perhaps, if football were more egalitarian, “miracles” would happen on a more regular basis. Think about major sports in America – NFL, MLS, NBA and baseball, where more than half of the teams involve have been former champions of some sort.

Anyway, in football, there have been a lot of wonderful things. The one that all football fans of a certain age remember is the Malaysia Cup. And it's pretty unfair for Singapore to be out of that Malaysia Cup, given that in its history, in the pre-war days, Singapore has been one of the main teams in that competition. It's pretty remarkable that during the golden era of the Malaysia Cup, Singapore would be one of the strongest teams, year in year out, and still winning it would be a rarity, partially due to biased refereeing. But when Singapore won it for the final time, in 1994, it would be some kind of miracle, given how close Singapore was in 1990 and 1993.

There would be the miracle of Denmark winning the Euros in 1992. And it would be really interesting that the Euros had a history of small countries winning it – the USSR, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Greece, Portugal.

There were a lot of small clubs winning European Cups in the 1980s, but possibly that was the reason why the Champions League was set up – it was making the larger and more powerful rich clubs angry. From 1967 to 1993, you had Celtic, Feyenoord, Ajax Amsterdam, Nottingham Forest, Aston Villa, Hamburg, Porto, Steaua Bucharest, PSV Eindhoven, Marseilles and Red Star Belgrade winning the thing. After the Champion's League, it would be easier to stop unwanted surprises, but it would still be a cup format. There would be surprise packages like Porto FC, Inter Milan and Borussia Dortmund winning it. And there would still be surprise finalists like Atletico Madrid, Valencia, Monaco and Tottenham Hotspur reaching the final. And there would also be a debate over whether Paris Saint Germain would be a surprise package.

There would be surprise league winners. Because of how successful Manchester United has been, people often forget that breaking their duck in 1993 was a really big thing. Because Blackburn Rovers had always been a strong team since I started following English football, I didn't really appreciate that their league win in 1995 was such a shock. Of course, Man U and Blackburn were smaller clubs who became bigger clubs. Man U turned from a sleeping giant back into a giant, thanks to the genius of Alex Ferguson. Blackburn Rovers was bankrolled by a local tycoon, and noveau riche clubs often end up breaking a long drought. When Newcastle stormed to a seemingly unassailable lead at the end of 1995, I assumed that they were going to follow the way of Blackburn and become a great club for a few years, but that didn't happen.

Somehow, though, it was fun watching clubs like Leeds, Portsmouth and Middlesborough flirt with being great clubs (or at least clubs that entered Europe regularly). Well, didn't happen.

Unfortunately, the next big club to emerge would be Arsenal, and they would form a dynasty – at least for 7 years. And there would be the big Man U-Arsenal rivalry. Then it became the big 4 of the 00s, with Liverpool and Chelsea joining. Then the big 4 became the big 6, when Man City and Tottenham came in.

The great Ajax team in the mid 1990s was a singular thing, because it had an unusual collection of future stars, perhaps only rivalled by Man U at that time. I thought it was a foregone conclusion that Ajax Amsterdam (and by extension, the Dutch) would produce so many great stars, but that would be the last gasp of a great talent factory.

And the 90s were also the heyday of Serie A, which was a bit like what the Premier League was like in the 2010s – dynasties had yet to be formed. Sampdoria, Verona and Napoli won shock titles. I thought that Parma and Fiorentina being a great club was normal (it wasn't). And I thought that Roma and Lazio winning Serie A was normal (again, no).

And the Spanish League would also have a short spell of weirdness, with Deportivo La Coruna and Valencia winning leagues, and even Valencia reaching UCL finals. But most of the time, we'd have to settle for the duopoly of Real Madrid and Barcelona, with Atletico Madrid occasionally pipping a few underdog stories.

Sometimes, there can be truly earth shattering shocks, like Leicester City taking advantage of Chelsea, Man City, Arsenal and Tottenham simultaneously going to sleep, to nip in and take the title. But that was the season when Arsenal also found out that their league title drought was going to continue, when they would have the best chance for years to win and fell short. Likewise, Tottenham would overachieve and come as close to the EPL as they've ever been.

There are other shocks that feel like a long drought is over, but they actually herald the rise of a dynasty. France winning the World Cup in 1998 felt a bit like an upset, considering how seemingly dominant Brazil was in the late 1990s. But they would follow it up with a Euros win in 2000 and a World Cup runner up in 2006, and only a shock from Greece denying them in 2004. Spain winning the Euros in 2008 also felt like a wonderful underdog story, since it was the end of a 44 year drought, but then they followed up with a World Cup and another Euro. Similarly, Liverpool ending the drought in 2020 wasn't a big fluke, like a Leicester or maybe even a Tottenham win, but a purple patch which also included a Champion's League and a Champion's League runner up.

But there were teams that were nearly men. There were golden generations which never resulted in any titles. There was Holland, who seemed to reach the semi-finals with some regularity (1992, 2000, 2004, 1998, 2014), but never seemed to be better than that. There was the Czechs, who had some peak in 2004, and the Portuguese, also in 2004, but they had to wait until 2016, when they were truly the dark horses. Of course, Argentina deserves a mention, because if they don't win a major title, Lionel Messi does not win a major title. He had the nightmare of finishing second in the World Cup, then second – twice – in the Copa America. Well, he has a chance this year at the Copa America, so we'll see.

And maybe we might think of the present England and Belgium teams, who have reached the World Cup 2018 semi-finals, as could've been nearly men. Or they might win a prize and become immortals. We're also asking ourselves whether PSG and Man City could become champions of Europe, or maybe Guardiola could screw this up every single year by having a big brainfart ahead of a super important game, the way he was doomed to never ever win the UCL with Bayern Munich.

Then there are teams like Italy in the World Cup or Chelsea in the UCL. You might scratch your head at Italy being one of the all time great countries of the World Cup, with 4 wins, only bettered by the Brazillians. But they are the perennial pretty good team, who always come up with a good show. Sometimes they will be beaten finallists (1994 and 2000), and sometimes they will win by default (1982 and 2006). Similarly, Chelsea in the UCL (and also Bayern Munich too) get to the semi-finals so often (every 2-3 years) that they are bound to win by default every now and then, although sometimes I wonder how on earth Man City screwed it up in 2021.

And on top of miracle title wins, there have also been miracle results of matches. Like Man U completing their 1999 treble with 2 late goals, Liverpool's Miracle of Istanbul, or Chelsea snatching a win against Bayern Munich for their first UCL win.

Anyway, I seem to have written a lot of crap. I only really wanted to say: football “miracles” seem to be more common than you'd expect. I've seen a few things that seem unbelievable, and yet after scanning the football pages for decades, It's come to the point where nothing's truly surprising anymore. Nobody was even thinking about Leicester winning their league title, and it was their second miracle EPL season in a row (the previous season was about a miracle escape from relegation). But it was a running joke that Liverpool hadn't won a title for such a long time, and yet it has done so in 2020, after being cruelly denied in 2019.

As I'm writing this, the quarterfinals of Euro 2020 (and Copa America 2021) are about to begin. Who knows what will happen? Maybe Leo Messi could win his first international football title. Or England or Belgium could win their first Euros title.