Champions League 2001: Barcelona vs Leeds United
Step one is Alan Smith kicking Rivaldo. Step two is Olivier Dacourt kicking Rivaldo. Step three is Rivaldo is orchestrating a move, swerving around Duberry and shooting past Martyn. The game isn't ten minutes old.
2025/26 season marks 25 years since Leeds United were playing in the Champions League, and even if it does feel like yesterday, it's worth going back to check what happened.
Throughout this season I'll be writing about the Champions League campaign game by game, roughly around the anniversary of each match.
Here's a reminder of the story so far:
Leeds United vs 1860 Munich: The main show came from Costas Kapitanis. The Champions League had been the Peacocks' aim for a decade, or three, and achieving it meant remembering the bad times Leeds had in Europe in the 1970s.
1860 Munich vs Leeds United: The symbol of it all was Nigel Martyn, saving shots, catching crosses, and submitting himself to Leeds United's permanent pictorial history by failing to notice when his head was cut at the feet of apologetic Bernhard Winkler.
Leeds United. The European Cup. Camp Nou. Barcelona. 1975, the Revie era, the road to Paris and Munich and all that. Not, though, now. Now it's September in the year 2000 and Leeds United are in the Champions League, David O'Leary, babies, the nation's second favourite team (court cases pending) and all that. All this was very unexpected when George Graham walked out and Martin O'Neill declined to walk in, and until David Wetherall headed Bradford City and Leeds United to the pinnacle. How will Leeds take on this new challenge?
Step one is Alan Smith, Smithy, the player O'Leary said in summer should curb his 'thuggish' habits, kicking Rivaldo, the Brazilian superstar, really hard. Rivaldo was already on his way to the floor from a really hard kick from Ian Harte.
Step two is Olivier Dacourt, a yellow card magnet when he was playing for Everton in the Premier League, challenging card-happy referee Marcus Merk by kicking Rivaldo, really hard.
Step three is Rivaldo flicking the ball around Dacourt to Patrick Kluivert, whose deep movement pulls Lucas Radebe out of the backline as he gives the ball back to Rivaldo. Dacourt chases Rivaldo and goes to ground as he tackles him, sending the ball wide to Simão, who immediately squares it back to Rivaldo in all his freedom. Seeing the danger Michael Duberry sprints across the penalty area and slide tackles thin air, passing through Rivaldo's eyelines in a flash, leaving Dani García unmarked in the box. Rivaldo could give him a tap in. Instead he snaps a shot past Nigel Martyn and inside the near post. The game isn't ten minutes old.
It's an early lesson and Leeds learn nothing. Ten minutes later Dacourt kicks Rivaldo. Frank de Boer wanders forward for a look at the free-kick, and hammers it in off the joint of crossbar and post. A few minutes later Barcelona's defenders are playing head tennis to keep the ball away from Michael Bridges and Smith, the Leeds fans are trying to be defiant by singing 'We're Leeds and we're proud of it', and a graphic on the television coverage shows Barcelona have had 71 per cent of the ball. A few minutes before half-time Danny Mills fouls Simão with all the height and studs he can get away with in return for a yellow card. The TV cameras zoom in on the stud marks all down Simão's thigh.
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