Penalty Post Script

Little did I know when I wrote yesterday's posting what a thriller we were in for! After a scrappy start (twenty minutes of nothing particularly impressive), an own goal for Liverpool and then a gaffe from their goalie, things seemed to be going West Ham's way. Yet the match ended at full time with the score line at 3-3 -helped largely by a "hat trick" by Liverpool's Steven Gerrard. It remained so after extra time. Sadly this meant the result had to be decided on penalties, and perhaps inevitably Liverpool then went on to win. As Gerrard himself put it "we summoned up the spirit of Istanbul", referring to The Reds win on penalties in the European Cup just short of a year ago, another nail-biting escape from defeat.

For balance though, I should mention that no less exciting for Scottish supporters was the contest between the tiny team of Gretna, famous for its Green and teenage marriages of yore, and Hearts. The village team with a population of 600 had made it through to the final of the Scottish FA Cup, and their match too was level at full time and went to penalties. Hearts won 4-2, but Gretna surely captured the hearts of many a football crazy Caledonian.

Needless to say, this morning all the talk in the media is of "the greatest FA cup final for ages"- but the real action is yet to come. Love it or hate it, there will be no escape from soccer through til the 9th July with, supposedly, billions viewing the World Cup throughout the world. And English expectations once again move to the hope of lifting the Jules Rimet trophy in Germany, as they did against them forty years ago at the old Wembley Stadium.
The pessimist in me can't help thinking the hopes will all be to no avail despite all the flag-waving, but who am I to say. If a young guy can come from nowhere against the world to win the world, there's hope. Surely I must mean England's hero of 66, former West Ham player Sir Geoff Hurst, showing mixed loyalties this year by advertising for the German Tourist Board on London Underground?
Hardly. The young guy saving the world hung on a cross nearly two thousand years ago. With nails hammered excrutiatingly through his flesh to the post, he was there to save us all not on penalties but from penalty- our deserved red card from God. Yet he rose again in extra time- eternal time- three days later. His match on this earth lasted thirty three years. His legacy and the hope he brings has lasted far more than forty, indeed unlike Geoff Hurst or any sporting heroes, this hero will be with us always, until the end of the age. He has captured, and will continue to capture billions of hearts. He had rescued men and women for twenty centuries from a crushing defeat at the hands of a devilishly red enemy, by his own life given up for his side. Alleluia, what a Saviour!