UEFA Super Cup 2023

My blog consists mainly of concert posts, but I've only written a sports post once and that had to do with the London 2012 Olympic Games. I do attend sports events every once in a while, though, most notably Basketball European and World Championships (with a Final Four thrown in the mix) and a Euro 2008 match in Salzburg. But the football match I attended in August was definitely an important one, worth writing a blog post about: The 2023 UEFA Super Cup final. This is a match between the Champions League winner and the Europa League winner. Every year I go into a lot of trouble in order to find a TV channel or a web site to see it. This year, as I was searching for the channel that would show it, I realized that I didn't need one. It would be held here in Greece. So, I applied for a ticket, didn't get one, but when some of the successful applicants did not pick up theirs, I finally got one. I was supporting Manchester City that night, because even though I am an Arsenal fan, I usually support the English teams (apart from Tot****am) on international games. I had actually been to the Manchester City store on my last visit to Manchester back in 2016 when I went to see The Stone Roses at Manchester City's stadium! And since I had already been to matches where Arsenal and Manchester United had played, City was one team that I had never seen "live".

As with every major international sports tournament, this was a celebration and a chance to meet people from other countries in one's city. My first stop on that day was Thissio where a big replica of the cup was on display.

My next stop was Piraeus, close to Karaiskaki Stadium where the final was taking place in order to visit the Fan Festival. This was an area where fans from both teams and local people as well could get together, eat and drink, play 5-a-side football and listen to music.

 

 

On top of that, across the street from the Fan Festival, the Champions League, Europa League and Super Cup trophies were on display (along with Manchester City's domestic trophies).

Then it was on to the stadium where we watched a football match with both teams scoring one goal each. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As it ended in a 1-1 draw, the winner was to be decided on penalties, but without extra time played beforehand, which means that the match never had the chance to go into "boring" status. I recorded the penalty shoot-out on video.

 

One thing that hasn't changed since the 90's is that Gala's "Freed From Desire" is played in all major sporting events

 

 

 

After the match and the award ceremony we set off on our way home where the local organizers had told us the metro would be running extra services to all destinations. However, in typical Greek fashion, mine stopped halfway through and we found ourselves stranded somewhere in Athens in the early hours of the morning until we were saved by a night bus.

 

Aerosmith live in Athens June 2010

They say that in Greece the only music fans that go to concerts are the heavy metal fans. So, if you offer them quality hard rock in the form of Aerosmith, they would jump at the chance, right? Wrong! The stadium was half empty. Many theories were formulated to explain that (maybe the tickets were too expensive, maybe the organizers made some mistake and so on...). The truth is that the tickets were no more expensive compared to the other concerts at the time. True, I bought an expensive one, but that's because I chose to, since I wanted to be as close to the stage as possible. And the brutal truth is that in order for the stadium to be full the band has to be called Scorpions. It's that simple...

  Anyway, Tyler and his gang didn't mind the low ticket sales (in contrast to other so-called "stars" who will refuse to play in a half empty stadium in order to maintain their "image") and they got on stage and gave it their all making this one of the best concerts we have ever experienced in Greece. They played both the "old" and the "new" songs. (By "new" I mean the 90's tracks featuring ballads such as "Cryin'" and "Crazy" which we would keep watching on MTV back in the day in order to see Alicia Silverstone and Liv Tyler.)

They actually started their set with "Love In An Elevator", which was introduced by a recording of Bob Dylan's "Rainy Day Women #12 & 35". In my original video I had included that introduction, which a few years later YouTube decided to mute (only the intro, mind you) because, well, it's a Bob Dylan song and Bob Dylan doesn't like his songs being on YouTube...

Steven Tyler even asked us to admire his "amazing body" which he has at his age and which he got "by eating Greek salad".  

SETLIST:
01. Love In An Elevator
02. Back In The Saddle
03. Falling In Love (Is Hard On The Knees)
04. Eat The Rich
05. Pink
06. Livin' On The Edge
07. What It Takes
08. Rag Doll
09. Crazy
10. Cryin'
11. Drum Solo
12. Lord Of The Thighs
13. Stop Messin' Around
14. I Don't Want To Miss a Thing
15. Sweet Emotion
16. Guitar Solo
17. Third Stone From The Sun
18. Baby, Please Don't Go
19. Draw The Line
Encore:
20. Dream On
21. Walk This Way
22. Toys In The Attic

The Love Affair Between Scorpions And Greece

To be fair, Greece has a "love affair" with a few other groups as well. The most common example,(after Scorpions) is Puressence (now disbanded). Then it's James, followed by Placebo, even Depeche Mode. All these bands visit Greece on every one of their tours. And if, in the case of Depeche Mode, it can be said that they are popular all over the world, Puressence only have such a big fanbase in Greece (They even used a Greek model on the cover of their latest compilation album). And Scorpions of course. When they were asked to do an "MTV Unplugged" show they immediately asked to do it in Greece. They knew that in no other country would they sell so many tickets, even in the midst of a recession.

So how did this happen? I will try to explain it from my own point of view, they way I've experienced it through my teenage years at school. This was in the 80's (and please put your calculators away). Now school kids in those days would listen to different kinds of music, although Greek music wasn't as popular in those ages as it is now. Disco had been out of fashion several years before, so it wasn't a case of a "rock - disco" rivalry. Probably more of a "rock - pop" rivalry, or a "hard rock - pop" one. Scorpions were considered to be "hard rock" or even "heavy metal" by the Greek teenagers of that era. And there were those who would listen to music from both genres but only one was considered "serious music". So what was considered "serious music" back then? Well, definitely rock, not pop, and only certain groups. Number 1 on the "seriousness" category were The Doors. This was supposed to be because of "the messages" carried in their lyrics, but then again it could be because Jim Morrison was such a big hunk (Well, most of their fans were girls, so I rest my case). Scorpions did not have these big "messages" in their lyrics like The Doors but their lyrics (especially on their slow songs) were all about LOVE and that was enough to make teenage girls weak at the knees. And it was their slow songs that were most popular. Think : "Always somewhere...I'll be back to love you again..." (Everybody now : "Aaaahhhhh!"). Now, what about us boys? Well, those of us who were rock fans would rather listen to AC/DC, Motorhead and Iron Maiden, but Scorpions was the only chance for us to dance "the blues" at parties. So, what do The Scorpions have to do with the blues? Nothing. Neither did Bonnie Tyler or George Michael for that matter. But somewhere along the line something was lost in translation and slow songs of any kind came to be known as "the blues" among teenage Greeks. So, even if we didn't like the Scorpions, WE HAD TO LIKE THEM, because this was our only chance to dance close at parties with a girl ("close" meaning "touching").

Well, all those years later, those teenage boys and girls have grown up, most of them have their own families and responsibilities, many of them probably don't listen to music anymore (well, certainly not rock music) but when they hear that "Scorpions are coming to Greece" something seems to move inside them and they rush out to buy tickets.

So the Scorpions keep on coming to Greece. Somehow though, I always missed them. Even in the 90's when I was studying in Britain, they came for a UK tour and my Greek fellow students asked me to go with them but I couldn't for some reason (Probably I didn't have enough money). Finally in 2006 I decided to go when they came to Athens to play together with Whitesnake (and I must admit I enjoyed Whitesnake more). Well, I thought I was done with them.

The only thing bugging me was that they did not play any songs from their early years with Uli Jon Roth (eg songs like "Pictured Life" and "In Trance"). The next year, 2007, they came again, and they did play songs from that era, but I was abroad to see The Rolling Stones.

Finally, 4 years ago they announced that they were finally disbanding and that they would come to Athens for one final concert. Some friends wanted to go, so I went with them, but once again they did not play anything from their early years.

While waiting in line to get in the venue, I was handed a flyer announcing that Uli Jon Roth was coming with his own band, so I went to that one as well and finally got to hear those songs.

We all know what happened next. They decided not to disband and they came for 3(!) MTV Unplugged dates (And all 3 were sold out). So why did I go? Well, probably because I thought it would be something different playing with acoustic instruments and several guests (one of them was Morten Harket, the singer from A-Ha singing on "Wind Of Change" but I did not recognize him after all these years), probably because the show would be later released on DVD and I would have a souvenir, probably it was just a "WTF?" factor.

MVI_1642 από papdx

But I did go in the end and in a way I was glad because they finally played "Pictured Life" and "In Trance" in my presence...