On 16 September 1987, Diego Maradona’s Napoli travelled to La Quinta del Buitre’s Real Madrid to play a first round, first leg match of the European Cup. Madrid won 2-0 with the return at the San Paolo drawn 1-1, meaning elimination for I Partenopei, gone from the competition almost before they arrived.
Silvio Berlusconi was not impressed, unhappy to lose one of the favourites were so early and also unwilling to risk similar happening to AC Milan, the club he owned. So he propagated the idea of a European super league and, though it never came to fruition, a spooked Uefa caved anyway and, five years later, the Champions League came into being.
But that was not enough, because it never is. First, it was more than one team from the richest countries – that’s now up to five in some cases – and now it’s the Swiss model format, which takes the Berlusconi rationale to it’s natural conclusion: lots of lucrative matches between the richest teams, without the jeopardy of elimination. Gabriel Hanot, who came up with the original idea of continental competition, would be crying bitter tears this very day, while the rest of us have no choice but to enjoy Real Madrid v Internazionale.
Which, of course, is ridiculously easily done, football a victim of its own nonpareil. There’s no shortage of interest in seeing whether José Mourinho, handed his latest last chance, has finally rediscovered the magic of his old self, while former acolyte, Cristian Chivu, is freshly installed at Inter, where his old boss did perhaps his best work
Nor is that all. We’ll also enjoy Dortmund – and, in particular, Konstantinos Karetsas, the 18-year-old midfielder who’s made a brilliant start to life at the Westfalen – against Villarreal, with updates from Porto v Manchester City and Lille v Real Betis. Quite what any of it means is unclear, but who needs context when you’ve got millions of eyeballs obsessing over potentially brilliant football?
And, on top of all that, we’ll keep you apprised of all the goings-on in the League Cup, so crack a can of Crypto, dip into your packet of energy, and settle in.
Kick-offs: League Cup 7.45pm/8pm BST, Champions League 8pm BST