BANANA RESPONSE TO RELEGATION FEAR: HISTORIC MOMENTS AT ANFIELD

The Liverpool and Manchester City teams faced each other at the Anfield stadium. However, those extraordinary events experienced in the stands became engraved in minds much more than this giant match. The Manchester City team, which was judged by an independent commission for violating financial rules and was claimed to inflate its revenue by 900 million pounds between the years 2009 and 2018, faced a relegation danger. In this tough process, the Liverpool fans exhibited a very hostile attitude. The host fans, who opened harsh banners directed at the Manchester City players around the stadium and accused them of cheating, broke off a massive storm of whistles every time the opponent players touched the ball. Amidst all this giant pressure and relegation rumors, the Manchester City audience under the leadership of the 1894 fan group secretly smuggled hundreds of inflatable bananas into the away stand. This interesting action was a historic reference made to that dark period when the club fell to lower leagues in the year 1987 and the "Imre Banana" nickname attached to the legendary striker of those times, Imre Varadi. The fans emphasized that their team always had an up and down graphic like a rollercoaster and answered by adding a great humor to this conflict environment experienced with the football authorities. This inflatable banana tradition, which started in those difficult days of English football, came to life again in the Anfield away match years later. This clever answer given against that hostile attitude of the opponent fans and that high tension created carried that heavy pressure on the pitch to a different dimension even if for a moment. This nostalgic and humorous stance purely directed at their own history awakened a very wide echo in the English sports press.

IMAGE: THE SUN