Sports

Soccer

FA Cup Final

By BRIAN LANDMAN and LOUIS HAU
Published May 21, 2005

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WHO: Manchester United vs. Arsenal

WHERE: Cardiff, Wales

WHEN: Today, 10 a.m.

TV: Pay-per-view

WHAT: The oldest knockout soccer competition in the world. More than 600 professional, semi-pro and amateur English clubs compete for the trophy, first awarded in 1872. The top teams enter at a later stage; the finalists have played five rounds each to get here. This competition is separate from the regular season. The clubs meeting today are the most successful in the competition's history; Manchester United has won the cup a record 11 times and Arsenal, based in London, is second with nine titles.

Red Devils fans "at war'

Matthew Knight isn't sure exactly how much the pay-per-view telecast of today's FA Cup finale between Manchester United and Arsenal will set him back.

Like it matters.

Knight, 34, a native of Hampshire, England, who lives in Lithia and works for a Tampa Bay area insurance company, lives for following and supporting his beloved soccer club, Man United.

He started going to games at historic Old Trafford stadium as a teenager in the 1980s. He has a picture of himself with the club's manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, on his desk at work. When shares in Man United went public in the early 1990s, he bought some.

"That was my way of being connected," he said.

So what's a few dollars ($24.95) to watch the Red Devils going against their archrival in the championship game of the sport's oldest tournament?

It's a price he might think twice about in the future.

Blame Malcolm Glazer.

The Bucs owner recently pulled off a $1.47-billion takeover of Man United and has drawn the ire of the rabid Red Devil fans everywhere. That includes Glazer's second home, Tampa Bay.

"They have some of the most hostile fans," said Rodney Marsh, the former face of the Tampa Bay Rowdies in the heyday of the North American Soccer League who faced Man United many times as a player at Manchester City. "They would boo a funeral procession."

Man United fans have asked the team's senior executives to resign in protest. They're ripping up season tickets and urging a boycott of team merchandise and corporate sponsors.

And today at the FA Cup final, when they should be relishing the moment, fans are sure to protest outside - and inside - Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, Wales. Shareholders United, the most visible and best-organized fan group, has asked its members to wear black as a symbol of their mourning.

"When Rupert Murdoch tried to buy Manchester United a few years ago, the Manchester United supporters and shareholders went ballistic, so it's not unique to Glazer," said Marsh, a radio analyst during Premier League games. "They just don't want anybody from the outside coming in who knows nothing about what we call football, trying to run their club."

But the venom and resistance toward Glazer seems harsher.

"If Malcolm Glazer and his bankers are sitting back thinking that they have won and that everything will fall into their hands, that resistance will fade away ... well, they don't have a clue about the people of Manchester and Manchester United fans in particular," Shareholders United's board said in a statement Friday.

While Shareholders United counsels its fans to protest peacefully, it has been rallying the troops with war-like language and imagery. The group's Web site features a photo of Glazer in the middle of a bull's eye and lists the business addresses, phone numbers and e-mail addresses of the Glazers and their attorneys, financial advisers and public-relations firms.

"Make sure these people know the utter hostility with which we are treating Malcolm Glazer's bid," the Web site says.

Due to security concerns, Glazer has asked British regulators for an exemption from a rule stipulating that corporate directors make their home addresses public. Other Man United directors, such as chairman Sir Roy Gardner and chief executive David Gill, also keep their home addresses confidential.

Shareholders United chairman Nick Towle downplayed the bellicose rhetoric used by his group, describing it as "all good, knockabout fan stuff."

But Towle acknowledged that he and other Man United fans feel that they're at war. "I'm not talking about a military war but a war to win back our club," he said.

Knight, too, is strongly opposed to Glazer's takeover, arguing that it appears the Bucs owner is only interested in squeezing profits out of the team and his bid has saddled the team with so much debt that it won't be able to sign elite players.

Still, for him, today is about what's happening on the field.

Man United has won the prestigious FA Cup a record 11 times since its inception in 1872. Arsenal is next at nine. The rivalry between the two clubs has increased in recent years. United star Roy Keane and Arsenal's Patrick Vieira had a confrontation in the tunnel before a February meeting. All of that should make for a compelling couple of hours of action and, the participants insist, there's no need for a distracting subplot involving Glazer.

"Of course the fans are emotional and that is understandable," Ferguson told the Sun, the biggest-selling tabloid in Britain. "They have shown great loyalty over the years and I am sure they will not let us down. It is their big day, too; they want us to win a cup. So I want there to be a United front on Saturday. Together, we can win this cup."

Rest assured, Knight will be watching no matter the cost.

At least, for now.

[Last modified May 21, 2005, 01:04:09]

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