With the Premier League season about to get underway, SETH GILLMAN, pictured below, looks back on Palace’s night of nights in May when the Eagles soared to their first European trophy at the Conference League final
Wednesday May 27 – Matchday
I rest in the hotel until lunchtime, then make my way into town, first for refreshment and sustenance, then on to the Red Bull Stadium for the game. I find myself on the sun-drenched balcony of a bar in the city centre. It’s packed with the travelling Palace faithful, whose red and blue attire gleams in the bright sunlight.
With food and drink flowing freely, I speak to Tracey and Jo, who were travelling alone until they met and bonded on the journey to Leipzig. Both started watching Palace as children but later had to stop for family and logistical reasons, then began again in the last few years.
Jo had been dubious about the cost of coming, but asked herself when this opportunity might arrive again. “I haven’t regretted it one little bit,” she says. Tracey nods in agreement. “It took 50 years of me supporting to win the FA Cup,” she says. “Just being in this final feels like a win.”
Jo concurs: “I might never see it again.” I ask their predictions for the game. “7-0 to us,” says Tracey, with a mischievous smile. I admire her optimism but can’t agree. I remain convinced it’ll be one goal either way and won’t be surprised if it goes to extra time.
Leipzig by night: on the eve of the UEFA Conference League final in Germany, Palace fans took over the city centre
The sun is beating down on the balcony and I duck inside to escape the heat. It’s now late afternoon and the red-and-blue bedecked hordes are starting to emerge from the city’s bars and restaurants and head to the stadium.
The Palace Ultras, aka the Holmesdale Fanatics, have organised a march to the ground but my Parkinson’s-affected limbs are stiff and aching, so I choose instead to take a bus arranged by the club. As we set off, I’m joined by Hugo, who turns out to be a thought-provoking and affable companion on the journey.
Hugo, like so many of us, was taken to Selhurst as a child by his dad. He has remained loyal to Palace for the 55 years since. We chat about each other’s experience through the long, fallow years and recent successes, culminating in the FA Cup win last May.
Mixing with club heroes: Seth Gillman in a Leipzig bar with Mark Bright
I ask Hugo how he’s feeling about today’s game. “Calm,” he replies. How can he be? I’m a bag of nerves! “An omen. On FA Cup final day, and repeated today,” Hugo explains. “A very good friend of mine died five years ago. Completely by chance, I bumped into his son on the day of the FA Cup final. I knew he’d be there but we hadn’t arranged to meet.
“Today, totally at random, I bumped into him again.”
So there we are, it’s already in the bag if Hugo’s right. I’m not sure I believe in omens, or fate, or superstitions, but I’ll clutch any straw going if it means we might win another trophy. I decide not to argue the toss with Hugo; he does seem remarkably calm and confident after all. Perhaps it’s true, I think. Maybe the universe is doing its aligning thing again and we really are on the brink of European glory.
Hugo and I fall into silence as we contemplate what may unfold over the next few hours. We’re soon rudely jolted out of our daydreams as the bus shudders to a halt and we’re told to disembark. “Bloody hell,” someone behind me says, who’s been following the bus’s meandering progress on his phone’s satnav. “We’re still miles away. It would’ve been quicker to walk!” That’s not much of an omen, I say to myself, as the bus disgorges its passengers and we begin our trudge to the Red Bull Arena.
As the stadium draws closer, we cross a river bridge and I gaze down at the calm blue water flowing beneath. A family of swans are fussing in the reeds for morsels of food and a few small boats glide serenely across the water, which glistens in the early evening sunlight. Above the river, a pale moon hangs silently in the cloudless blue sky and I can see people sitting or strolling peacefully on the lush green riverbank.
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As I take in this romantic scene, in my mind’s eye I contrast it with what’s to come in the stadium, in just a couple of hours’ time.
The swelling strains of “Sarr, Sarr will tear you apart, again” snap me out of my reverie and I restart my journey, now with butterflies beginning to flutter in my belly, and the stadium rising in the distance like Shangri-La, beckoning us to its fabled gates.
The sun is lowering in the sky and the air is heavy and moist as we near the ground. Dust rises from the sunburnt path, stirred by legions of feet. I feel my skin prickling with sweat and nerves but am soon swept along in the joyous mood of the thousands of Palace fans singing and chatting, waving scarves and banners, some specially made for today’s game.
One says, “Mr Marinakis, who’s laughing now,” which earns laughs and cheers of approval from the joyous fans.
The Rayo Vallecano supporters are approaching from the other end of the stadium, so it’s just Palace now, apart from one bloke in a Bayern Munich jersey with “Olise” on the back. He turns with a grin as people clock his shirt and start to sing, “Michael, Michael Olise, runs down the wing for me…”
Meeting demand: Germany not only has mobile beer vendors, but the fans can take their drink into the stands
After interminable security, bag and ticket checks, at last we reach the ground. The excitement builds to ever higher levels and as we enter the stadium the entire building, from foundation to roof, feels like it’s buzzing with the vibration of billions of gallons of adrenalin and dopamine coursing through the fans’ brains.
Added to these natural highs, hundreds of litres of beer are being served and guzzled at an increasingly frenetic rate, as the red and blue masses continue to pour into the ground and catch their first glimpse of the magnificent stadium, with its vertiginous stands and glistening pitch appearing as if a mythical castle, glimmering in the setting sun.
I try to locate my seat but it’s in the section reserved by the Ultras and can’t get near it.
Along with many others, I stand in the gangway as the players emerge, a huge roar greeting their arrival. The two sets of fans unveil their tifos – ours rolls over our heads and up into the heights of the stand.
Underneath the tifo, we raise our arms to hold it up until it is rolled back again and we can see the teams on the pitch going through their warmups and we know that kick-off is not far away.
Joyful anticipation: Palace fans gather outside the Red Bull Stadium
The first half passes in a blur. A few chances from both teams, then a big one near the end of the half as Tyrick Mitchell is unable to head home a sumptuous cross from Adam Wharton.
It’s 0-0 at the break and all still to play for.
I head to the concourse to use the loo and for refreshment. The queues are long and slow (German efficiency? Ha!) and the game has restarted by the time I’ve endured a long wait for both. I hear a rising roar of anticipation swell from the Palace fans and, hurrying to the top of the gangway, I’m just in time to see Mateta’s instinctive shot send the ball looping into the Rayo net. Boom!
Chaos ensues. Limbs fly. Hundreds of pints of beer are flung into the Leipzig night air and fall back as rain, showering the frenziedly celebrating Palace faithful with drops of cool, hoppy jubilation.
When Yeremy Pino’s brilliant free-kick hits both posts and somehow doesn’t cross the line, I wonder if we might live to regret the lost opportunity to make it 2-0 and surely seal the win. But it’s our night and as the game wears on, the atmosphere rises to glorious, feverish crescendos, even as nerves jangle and twist, just like the FA Cup final. I know at 1-0 it’s still in the balance, one mistake, one moment of genius could still swing it against us.
Magic moments: the Holmesdale Fanatics unveil their vast tifo in Leipzig
But try as they might, Rayo are unable to break through the red and blue resistance, and at last the final whistle blows and the Leipzig skies echo with the sound of Palace ecstasy and Rayo desolation.
I had wondered, if we won this UEFA Conference League final, how it would feel compared to the FA Cup victory. As the players celebrate on the pitch and the fans hug each other in delight, I start to process the fact we’d won yet another trophy.
In the moment I am completely blown away by the whole experience, so different to the regular trips to Selhurst or away games in England. To be in a foreign land with so many other Palace fans is unique in itself, and to witness us win more silverware is very special indeed.
Looking back now I can say it felt different to the FA Cup win, but equally, very much the same.
Impressively, the Rayo fans all stay long after the final whistle ends their epic, valiant pilgrimage to the final. As is their tradition, the players stand before them for many minutes gazing silently into the crowd, connecting with the supporters on a deeply meaningful level, and in so doing begin to understand what emotions they are experiencing.
It’s a powerful ritual which contrasts jarringly with what happens in England, where many fans will be on their toes without hesitation if their team is performing poorly or has lost a big game, and players in England who seem acutely reluctant at times to even acknowledge their fans, let alone spend time trying to understand how they are feeling.
It is only after the Rayo players have received their runners-up medals and Palace have been presented the trophy, and celebrated wildly with the Palace faithful, that the last Rayo fans start to make their way to the exits.
Another trophy: goal-scorer Jean-Philippe Mateta celebrates in front of Palace’s fans in Leipzig with the Conference League silverware
The Palace celebrations continue long into the night. Much like after the FA Cup win, we feel a cocktail of euphoria and joy, disbelief and relief. These are but brief moments in time, soon to be gone like a dandelion clock, but forever captured in the hearts and minds of those who were there to see them unfold.
At some point, I know not the hour, I collapse into bed and sleep the sleep of the glorious, victorious and sozzled.
Thursday May 29
I wake and lever myself blearily upright. I glance at my phone to see dozens of messages have landed from friends, family and fellow Palace fans. One in particular catches my eye: “Seth. What did I say? Never in doubt. Hugo.”
I smile, put my phone down and sink back onto the bed. Bloody hell, I think. We’ve only gone and done it again.
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