Somehow, two decades have passed since the greatest night in the history of Liverpool Football Club. Here, we’re going back in time to relive it all again and assess the impact it continues to have to this day.
It was the night that changed everything.
Football will forever be cyclical and memories can always be displaced, but every now and then a moment comes along that redefines what it means to be physically or emotionally involved with a football club.
For Liverpool, that moment came on May 25, 2005. Rafa Benitez had taken his team to the brink of club football’s biggest prize within 12 months of his arrival in inexplicable fashion.
Sheer force of will had been enough to help an inspired Steven Gerrard drag his colleagues over the line against some of the most dangerous sides on the planet.
Such opportunities don’t present themselves too often, but a genuine sporting superpower remained stood between the Reds and permanent custody of ol’ Big Ears. We had no right to expect, but it was a team that had already given us reason to dream beyond its limitations.
A baptism of fire
The scale of the task was hammered home within seconds.
Paolo Maldini, perhaps the greatest defender to ever live, fired AC Milan into what remains the earliest Champions League final lead, sapping the euphoria from three sides of the Ataturk Stadium.
Anfield had been a secret weapon in guiding Liverpool to the unlikeliest of promised lands, and while the travelling Kop had descended upon the grandest stage of all in numbers to dwarf their Italian counterparts, the early indications were that this might have been a step too far.
Hernan Crespo was the man to bring the ominous doom to life. He combined with Andriy Shevchenko to double the advantage and latched on to a sumptuous Kaka pass to race out of sight.
Superstars everywhere you looked.
It shouldn’t have been our night and perhaps it didn’t need to be. This was a team in the infancy of its domestic and continental pilgrimage, and every imperfection was being brutally exposed before our eyes.
Something changed at half time that simultaneously encapsulated the perpetual jeopardy and ridiculousness of football.
For the same reason that magicians conceal their secrets for the benefit of their craft, it is best not to bother applying logic to what happened between the 54th and 60th minute of the 2005 European Cup final.
The storm blistering its way towards the North Stand persisted, but the force behind those gusts had switched. In the blink of an eye, Liverpool had altered the course of history through their talismanic captain, Vladimir Smicer and Xabi Alonso.
A sonic boom detonated across the globe.
Miracles are possible
Incredibly, normal time proved insufficient and the tens of thousands of starry-eyed Reds packed into Turkiye’s national stadium were seeing their admirable blind faith vindicated in front of them.
We had defeated odds at the expense of Olympiakos, Juventus and Chelsea to make it this far, but this had become an unprecedented boundary-pushing exercise, the likes of which may never be seen again.
There are countless examples of extra time acting as a leveller, a victory of sorts for the underdog while the protagonists scratch their collective heads.
Dragging AC Milan into the championship rounds was something to be lauded, but circumstance had skewed perception further away from any sensible parameter.
I needn’t go into intricate details of what played out on the pitch because it’d almost definitely be an insult to your intelligence, and if you’re anything like me you’ve watched the game back countless times.
But, there was a moment during those additional 30 minutes which might shed light on the reason we’re often externally referred to as the devil’s club by our blue neighbours.
When the ball fell kindly to Shevchenko at close range for a second time of asking, Liverpool’s hopes and dreams lay at the mercy of the Ballon d’Or’s proprietor.
Fluctuation in the goalkeeping department had led to the No. 1 shirt to be passed between three different stoppers en route to the final. It wouldn’t be disrespectful to posit that the odds were astronomically stacked in favour of Ukraine’s greatest-ever player.
And yet, the higher powers propping up the wall stood firm. Jerzy Dudek’s evening had been mixed to that point but it was a double save which told the world this might just be his night.
Penalties beckoned and while the glamour names were perched on one side of the centre circle, the belief was heavily weighted toward the other.
A transformative night
A 26-year-old Andrea Pirlo joined Serginho in fluffing his lines from the spot on a night he later admitted had made him consider walking away from the game altogether.
Jon Dahl Tomasson and Kaka sandwiched a John Arne Riise lifeline, but destiny was dropped into the hands of Shevchenko once more.
Circumstance is devoid of relevance when it comes to goalkeepers in shootouts.
The opportunity to etch your name into folklore awaits anyone brave enough to put their neck on the line when it matters most, and Dudek promptly ensured he’d never need to buy a pint on Merseyside again in denying AC Milan‘s No. 7 for the final time.
It’s not just Dudek, either. Every single man in red immortalised themself that night.
I’ve since bumped into Dudek and Smicer in the city centre and have been fortunate enough to be around others in a professional capacity, the headline topic is always the same.
“I was there,” I drunkenly boasted to Smicer earlier this year.
He didn’t need to be a football historian to know what I was getting at, he simply smiled and agreed that he also couldn’t believe it had been 20 years.
During those 20 years, there have been Liverpool teams that would have wiped the floor with their 2005 counterparts, but therein lies the magic of football.
Simply playing any part in the final that reshaped our future earned you a lifetime pass to greatness, offsetting any previous misdemeanours in the process.
It was the night so many fell in love with Liverpool for the first time and though it has never quite been topped for drama, it set the tone for an eternity of bumpy yet beautiful rides.
