Scouseinthehouse
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Taking my lead from Hermanos' recently embryonic, and excellent, story on F.C. Internazionale Milano ( http://www.fm-base.co.uk/forum/football-manager-2015-manager-stories/305450-internazionale.html ); I've decided to take the plunge with my debut FM story on Inter's cross town neighbours, Associazione Calcio Milan.
But before I even begin playing a Milan save and start what I hope will be a LONG story (if intermittent in updates as I sadly don't get to play as much as I used to or would like with that darn irritating game of 'real life' taking precedence. Although as I'm currently house bound with a broken foot I hope to make a good start and really delve into this over the next month or so); I wanted to give some background on why Milan and my love affair with the Rossoneri.
It all started back in April 1989, at the lowest ebb of both my 14 year old life to that date and since. On a Wednesday evening, sat watching the sadly no longer BBC midweek sports highlight/ roundup show 'Sportsnight.' I was up late that night, as I had been in pretty much traumatised shock not wanting to sleep since the life changing events I'd gone through on the Saturday in Sheffield; when the main game of the programme was highlights of AC Milan's European Cup semi final against Real Madrid. (A game Sacchi's wonderful Milan side of the 3 Dutchmen won 5-0.). But it wasn't the football that so grabbed me as I blankly watched. It was the Milanese support in Northern Italy, a region and club with absolutely NO connection to my home City and club Liverpool, that utterly blew me away and brought tears of happiness to my eyes to replace the many of sadness the previous 5 days. For 6 minutes into the game, the exact time our own ill fated FA Cup semi final had been stopped as the horror unfolded at Hillsborough, they had organised for the officials to stop their tie, the European Cup semi final, and hold a minutes silence in respect of our loss. (Or 'applause', as is the custom in Italy.). As if that wasn't stunningly poignant enough, to then hear, in broken English, our anthem 'You'll Never Walk Alone' cascading down from the packed San Siro stands ..... I can't begin to tell you how much I needed that and how much it started my reconnection to a game I just didn't want ANYTHING to do with at that point
[video=youtube;mFX07w2-4ls]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFX07w2-4ls[/video]
And so began a 26 year love affair of my own with the magnificent football club that is AC Milan. And a life long bond between the two clubs and more so the 2 sets of fans that is real strong to this day. Liverpool are Milan's 'English' club. A 'second', foreign club if you like for the majority of AC fans. And the respect is reciprocated from a good many in Liverpool which has only intensified from the fantastic times had and new friendships formed through the 2 clubs meetings in the 2005 and 2007 Champions League finals in Istanbul and Athens respectively. And I consider myself exceptionally fortunate to of been drawn to Milan through an unbelievable 'golden age' of some of the greatest players and teams the game has ever seen (Marco Van Basten is my all time favourite non-Liverpool player); in an unparalleled era of success under all time great managers like Arrigo Sacchi, Fabio Capello and my favourite Carlo Ancelotti. (Hard to believe I watched him equal the great Bob Paisley as the only man to manage teams to 3 European Cup wins last year after I grew up watching him play. Kind of makes one feel pretty old. LOL.).
I've personally gotten the Milan bug to such an extent that when Liverpool played Inter in the 2008 Champions League last 16, I refused to go to the San Siro for the second leg on the basis that 'it just wouldn't be the same watching Inter there and not Milan!' In the same darn stadium! Go figure? Lol. And trust me when I say for a seasoned European traveller, that was a REAL hard thing for me to do. (And FWIW I'm told by equally seasoned European travelling friends that the San Siro is still the single best stadium they've ever had the privilege of watching L'pool in. And man have we been to most all the biggest and best the World has to offer.).
So apologies for the length of this intro, but I wanted to give you a small insight into the back story of a football mad Scouser's second love in Northern Italy.
The fact that love is currently at it's lowest 2 year point through the Presidents 30 year tenure just makes it the perfect time to try steady the ship and hopefully return the Rossoneri to their rightful place at Europe's top table. It should be quite the challenge given how far Milan have so dramatically fallen in such a short space of time. But one I can certainly get passionately behind.
I shall start this at some point over the weekend and update here as I go.
One small, but very BIG favour to ask as I'm a complete novice to this here board; would be for any and all help/ advice in maybe doing a header, and more importantly taking and transmitting screen shots from my game to here. (I'm on a MacBook Pro if that helps.). Or just any general advice to what you like to see when reading these. Appreciation in advance.
Thank you all for indulging me and I hope you get as much pleasure from what unfurls as I most certainly will in playing and relaying it.
FORZA MILAN!
But before I even begin playing a Milan save and start what I hope will be a LONG story (if intermittent in updates as I sadly don't get to play as much as I used to or would like with that darn irritating game of 'real life' taking precedence. Although as I'm currently house bound with a broken foot I hope to make a good start and really delve into this over the next month or so); I wanted to give some background on why Milan and my love affair with the Rossoneri.
It all started back in April 1989, at the lowest ebb of both my 14 year old life to that date and since. On a Wednesday evening, sat watching the sadly no longer BBC midweek sports highlight/ roundup show 'Sportsnight.' I was up late that night, as I had been in pretty much traumatised shock not wanting to sleep since the life changing events I'd gone through on the Saturday in Sheffield; when the main game of the programme was highlights of AC Milan's European Cup semi final against Real Madrid. (A game Sacchi's wonderful Milan side of the 3 Dutchmen won 5-0.). But it wasn't the football that so grabbed me as I blankly watched. It was the Milanese support in Northern Italy, a region and club with absolutely NO connection to my home City and club Liverpool, that utterly blew me away and brought tears of happiness to my eyes to replace the many of sadness the previous 5 days. For 6 minutes into the game, the exact time our own ill fated FA Cup semi final had been stopped as the horror unfolded at Hillsborough, they had organised for the officials to stop their tie, the European Cup semi final, and hold a minutes silence in respect of our loss. (Or 'applause', as is the custom in Italy.). As if that wasn't stunningly poignant enough, to then hear, in broken English, our anthem 'You'll Never Walk Alone' cascading down from the packed San Siro stands ..... I can't begin to tell you how much I needed that and how much it started my reconnection to a game I just didn't want ANYTHING to do with at that point
[video=youtube;mFX07w2-4ls]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFX07w2-4ls[/video]
And so began a 26 year love affair of my own with the magnificent football club that is AC Milan. And a life long bond between the two clubs and more so the 2 sets of fans that is real strong to this day. Liverpool are Milan's 'English' club. A 'second', foreign club if you like for the majority of AC fans. And the respect is reciprocated from a good many in Liverpool which has only intensified from the fantastic times had and new friendships formed through the 2 clubs meetings in the 2005 and 2007 Champions League finals in Istanbul and Athens respectively. And I consider myself exceptionally fortunate to of been drawn to Milan through an unbelievable 'golden age' of some of the greatest players and teams the game has ever seen (Marco Van Basten is my all time favourite non-Liverpool player); in an unparalleled era of success under all time great managers like Arrigo Sacchi, Fabio Capello and my favourite Carlo Ancelotti. (Hard to believe I watched him equal the great Bob Paisley as the only man to manage teams to 3 European Cup wins last year after I grew up watching him play. Kind of makes one feel pretty old. LOL.).
I've personally gotten the Milan bug to such an extent that when Liverpool played Inter in the 2008 Champions League last 16, I refused to go to the San Siro for the second leg on the basis that 'it just wouldn't be the same watching Inter there and not Milan!' In the same darn stadium! Go figure? Lol. And trust me when I say for a seasoned European traveller, that was a REAL hard thing for me to do. (And FWIW I'm told by equally seasoned European travelling friends that the San Siro is still the single best stadium they've ever had the privilege of watching L'pool in. And man have we been to most all the biggest and best the World has to offer.).
So apologies for the length of this intro, but I wanted to give you a small insight into the back story of a football mad Scouser's second love in Northern Italy.
The fact that love is currently at it's lowest 2 year point through the Presidents 30 year tenure just makes it the perfect time to try steady the ship and hopefully return the Rossoneri to their rightful place at Europe's top table. It should be quite the challenge given how far Milan have so dramatically fallen in such a short space of time. But one I can certainly get passionately behind.
I shall start this at some point over the weekend and update here as I go.
One small, but very BIG favour to ask as I'm a complete novice to this here board; would be for any and all help/ advice in maybe doing a header, and more importantly taking and transmitting screen shots from my game to here. (I'm on a MacBook Pro if that helps.). Or just any general advice to what you like to see when reading these. Appreciation in advance.
Thank you all for indulging me and I hope you get as much pleasure from what unfurls as I most certainly will in playing and relaying it.
FORZA MILAN!
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