16 Dec 2008(Tue)

Christmas is coming a week early this year. It may not have been as comprehensive as the ACL final, but Gamba Osaka secured a narrow 1-0 win on Sunday in their rematch with Adelaide United – who had beaten Waitakere United in their playoff – to clinch a place in the semi-finals of the FIFA Club World Cup. Perhaps there were nerves at the occasion, or despite coach Akira Nishino’s constant insistence on focusing solely on the matters at hand, perhaps the players and supporters had underestimated the opponents, but ultimately, the result is of far greater significance than the performance. Next up, on Thursday at the International Stadium in Yokohama, Gamba will come face to face with a true superpower in the form of Manchester United.

 

As Jeremy Walker writes in his column this week, it is meetings like these that represent the true meaning of the Club World Cup. The UEFA Champions League may justifiably be considered the ultimate challenge in Europe, in terms of its level both economically and on the pitch, but even in its first four years, the very existence of the Club World Cup is already contributing to much development in other regions. The ACL has been given new energy thanks to vastly heightened interest in countries like Japan, where clubs are bettering themselves in order to win the chance of (and, indeed, through their experience of) challenging for the continental and global crowns. As the first Japanese winners of the ACL last year, Urawa Reds earned the right to face AC Milan in the first ever competitive meeting between European and Asian clubs, and this game inspired the dreams of football fans not only in Saitama but across Japan and the rest of the region. This year, regardless of the result, the same dream has come true for Gamba.

 

It is an extra bonus that, like Milan, Manchester United are another club steeped in tradition, and indeed have a proud reputation as pioneers within the English game. Despite the objections of the FA, it was the determination of Sir Matt Busby that paved the way for English clubs to enter the European Champions’ Cup from 1956, and despite tragically losing so many of his young players in Munich two years later, Busby rebuilt the side in just ten years to become the first English champions of Europe in 1968. United also contested the Intercontinental Cup that year, losing out to Estudiantes of Argentina, but it was a source of personal pride to current manager Sir Alex Ferguson when his team beat Palmeiras of Brazil in 1999 to claim the Toyota Cup that had eluded Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. Just weeks after this triumph, United also played in the first FIFA Club World Championship in Brazil, and despite the toils of coming all the way to Japan, will be looking to write a new page in their history under the tournament’s latest guise this year.

 

United have not quite managed to fit Dimitar Berbatov into their system since his summer arrival and their goals tally has suffered as a result, but their defence has remained superbly and steadfastly marshalled by Rio Ferdinand and Nemanja Vidic, with five clean sheets in their last five league games. Such statistics suggest that the meeting between two typically attacking sides in United and Gamba may not be quite as high scoring as one would perhaps have predicted. Nonetheless, the match is still likely to be played at a fast, exciting pace, and with the two other semi-finalists, LDU Quito and Pachuca, also favouring an attacking game, supporters can hope for much entertainment from the tournament’s remaining games.

 

On a personal level, the prospect of a meeting between the team I have supported since before I started school, and my local team in my adopted country whose hardcore fans have taken me in as one of their own, is simply too unfathomably terrific for my writing skills to do justice. Even a club as big as United have only won the European crown on three occasions, while my first visit to Banpaku five years ago – standing on the grass banks that were there then – was to see a Gamba side with no realistic hopes of challenging in the J League, let alone the ACL. For my two teams to be facing each other now, in Japan, because of continental successes in the same year, is the most wonderful of coincidences.

 

As far back as the spring I was grappling with the dilemma of which to support in such a scenario, and even now, I am yet to reach a conclusion. Having bought my ticket not through either club but directly from FIFA, I do not even know in which end I will be sitting. I will just have to wear both teams’ shirts as a symbol of my confusion, but I suppose that on balance, assuming that a never-ending penalty shootout is out of the question, a close win for United would be the best result to bring satisfaction to both sides. My own position, I have decided, is purely win-win, and I cannot wait for Gamba’s chance to make a real impression on football fans back home.