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Sharuko On Saturday

SOMETIMES, simple numbers tell us very powerful stories but, as mere mortals, we don’t pick out the underlying meaning.

We are too busy to ask ourselves why, usually, there are 30 days in a month.

And, if, all this has any link to the start of the ministry of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, when he was 30?

We wonder why, after all this lengthy wait for a league title, fate had to ensure Liverpool had to be champions after 30 years?

We ask ourselves why this success story had to be written in the campaign, which started in the year in which Liverpool marked 30 years, since the Hillsborough disaster?

We look at the last manager to guide Liverpool to the league championship, 30 years ago, Kenny Dalglish, and we see that he used to wear the number seven, during his playing days at Anfield.

He arrived at Anfield in August ‘77 and his last goal for Liverpool came in April ‘87.

They call him King Kenny and, in the final days of their coronation, he has been the only special fan we have been seeing watching his beloved Reds from the stands.

God willing, he will be 70 in March next year and, whatever happens, he will say “I was there when Liverpool finally ended their lengthy wait for the league title’’.

Numbers fascinate me a lot and there are times I get this feeling we miss something from not attaching any value to them.

It’s like asking yourself why, for instance, do we have seven days in a week?

I look back at the moment Liverpool’s long wait was finally confirmed by the events at Chelsea on Thursday night, and there is so much to read from the numbers.

Like, why was it that, at the hour of their coronation two days ago, Liverpool had just dropped seven points (three during a surprise loss at Watford and four in two draws against Manchester United and Everton)?

Manchester United had seven shots, in that drawn match at Old Trafford, and Everton had seven shots, in that goalless match at Goodison Park on Sunday.

The coronation, somehow, had to come with seven games left to play in the season.

The number of goals which Liverpool have scored, so far in the league this season, is 70, they are seven goals short of the league leading tally of 77, by Manchester City, who will now certainly finish second.

For the Reds, the real rivals will always be Manchester United.

And, at the time Liverpool were confirmed champions on Thursday night, the difference, in terms of games lost, between the two giants, and great, rivals was seven matches.

Liverpool have one league loss and United have eight.

If Liverpool were to donate seven wins to United, assuming that was allowed in football, the Red Devils will take their tally to 70 and, interestingly, seven points clear of Manchester City, at this point.

We go back to the week when the coronavirus brought everything to a halt, in the English Premiership, threatening Liverpool’s party and we realise that their last match, before the enforced break, a 2-1 win over Bournemouth, had come on March 7.

This Liverpool success story has been built, to some extent, by the helping hand of Southampton who have shipped a number of their best players into the Reds fold in recent years.

Stars like Sadio Mane, Vigil van Dirk, Adam Lallana, Dejan Lovren, Nathaniel Clyne, Rickie Lambert and Peter Crouch, have found a path into the Reds family from the Saints.

Interestingly, if we combine the points the Saints, (their best ally), have right now (37), and the tally which United, (their worst foe), have (49), it gives us exactly 86 points, the tally Liverpool have and which was enough for them to be confirmed champions.

This is the seventh year since the season, which infamously culminated in that Steven Gerrad slip at Anfield, and virtually ended Liverpool’s title challenge, got underway in 2013.

Chelsea were the party spoilers that day, with a 2-1 win for the Blues, signalling the beginning of the end of Liverpool’s hearty challenge for honours.

Chelsea were once again involved on Thursday night, same score but different outcomes, with their impressive 2-1 win over Manchester City confirming Liverpool as champions.

Crystal Palace had hammered the final nail into Liverpool’s coffin that season, coming back from three goals down, to draw 3-3.

This time, as fate would have it, they were the last club the Reds played, before their confirmation as champions, and they were swept away in a four-goal demolition at Anfield on Wednesday.

A SIEGE ON IMMORTALITY, A MODEL OF GREATNESS

In more ways than one, Liverpool’s storming campaign to finally be league champions this season has been like a siege, a relentless quest to subdue the opposition, dropping just seven points so far this season.

We read the Bible, in particular the Book of Joshua, and it tells us about the siege of Jericho, and we all say, “wow,” that was an amazing victory by the Israelites as they conquered Canaan.

We are told it was the first battle, fought by the Israelites, “in the course of the conquest of Canaan.’’

And, that, the walls of Jericho finally fell on the seventh day of the siege, after the Israelites had marched seven times, on that single day alone.

Even Pharaoh’s dream featured seven skinny, and starving cows, devouring seven fat cows and seven ripe and healthy sheaves of wheat being devoured by seven shrivelled and dry ones.

For Liverpool, by winning the title with seven matches to spare, they became the first club to win the English Premiership title, with so many games in hand.

The Reds fairytale, if you really believe in the power of numbers, started last June when they won the UEFA Champions League with that victory over Tottenham.

Ahead of that Champions League final showdown last year, for those who believe in the power of numbers, especially the number seven, the stage had been set for Klopp and his Reds to triumph.

In seven preceding major knockout finals, ahead of that match, Klopp had lost all of them.

Borussia Dortmund crashed to a 1-2 defeat at the hands of Bayern Munich in the Champions League final in 2013, they then lost 0-2 to the same Bayern side in the German Cup (DFB Pokal) final in 2014 and fell to a 1-3 defeat to Wolfsburg, in the same cup final, in 2015.

Then, Klopp moved to Liverpool and, in his first major cup final, the Reds were beaten by Manchester City in the 2016 League Cup final;  the 1-3 defeat to Sevilla in the 2016 Europa League Cup final and the 1-3 defeat to Real Madrid in the 2018 Champions league final.

After seven straight defeats, the cycle appeared to have been complete and, in the Champions League final last year, there was always going to be one winner — Klopp and Liverpool.

Then, it was time to switch focus to the league and they have been relentless.

When they reached 61 points, in their first 21 games, this was the most number of points any club has ever accumulated, at that stage of the campaign, in the Euro Big Five                     Leagues.

The Reds have had a 25-point lead, this season, the biggest in English top-flight history, and the 3-2 defeat of West Ham in February was their 21st consecutive league home win, beating Manchester City’s record of 20, between 2011 and 2012.

Liverpool could become the first side to win all 19 home matches and, with 12 out of 15 matches away from home, victory in their remaining four games on the road will see them equal City’s total of 16 matches.

A further 14 points, from the 21 available, will see the Reds equal Manchester City’s record of 100 and, where City won the title by 19 points, in 2017/18, the Reds could beat that this season.

MAYBE, SOME THINGS, ARE JUST MEANT TO BE

Let’s try and stick with the hidden power of numbers, especially the number seven.

Next month marks the 70th anniversary of the Curse of the Maracazano when disaster struck, before 200 000 fans at the Maracana on July 16, 1950, after a mistake by goalkeeper Moacir Barbosa helped Uruguay beat hosts Brazil 2-1 in the 1950 World Cup decider.

The Brazilians, needing just a draw to be crowned World Cup winners, for the first time, were odd-on favourites, they had ran riot at the 1949 Copa America, thrashing Uruguay 5-1, Peru 7-1, Colombia 5-0, Bolivia 10-1 and Ecuador 9-1.

In the final, they crushed Paraguay 7-0.

And, at the 1950 World Cup, they thrashed Mexico 4-0, Sweden 7-1 and Spain 6-1 which, to many of their fans, meant their final decider against Uruguay, where they needed a draw to be champions in a tournament which used a round-robin format, was like a routine coronation match.

However, with the scores tied 1-1, and Brazil on their way to be champions, goalkeeper Barbosa made a fatal mistake in the 79th minute and Uruguay scored the goal that won them the match, and the tournament.

Barbosa never kept goal for Brazil again, after he was transformed into an effigy of national hate, haunted by his country for the rest of his life until his death, on April 7, 2000, after suffering a heart attack.

Somehow, Barbosa was 79, at the time of his death, the same minute when his blunder led Uruguay to score the decisive goal that plunged Brazil into mourning.

Alcides Ghiggia, the man who scored that priceless goal for Uruguay, was 88 when he died in 2015, his death coming on the same day, July 16, he scored that goal at the Maracana.

He was also the last, of the players who featured in that match, to die.

It was also in the 79th minute when Bruce Grobbelaar was beaten by Kalusha Bwalya’s header, in that decisive ’94 AFCON qualifier at the National Sports Stadium, with the goal propelling Chipolopolo to Tunisia, at the expense of the Warriors.

Bwalya was the man who, somehow, survived that plane crash, which wiped out a generation of his teammates off the coast of Gabon, as he was scheduled to fly directly to Senegal from his base in Europe.

So, what’s the conspiracy about the 79th minute?

Nobody knows but it’s pretty interesting to note that the verb, to curse, appears 79 times in the Old Testament.

This week, in this newspaper, we remembered giant goalkeeper, Edmore “ZiKeeper’’ Sibanda’s last appearance for the Warriors, in that 2019 AFCON opener against the Pharaohs of Egypt in Cairo, last June, when he turned on a man-of-the-match show, in a losing cause.

Somehow, as it appears, ZiKeeper’s last game for the Warriors had to come against the seven-time African champions.

And, after being injured in a collision, he lasted 77 minutes before being replaced by Elvis Chipezeze.

On his broad chest, during that match, was the tattoo of his son, Cedric — the darling he had lost, just three months earlier, after the boy succumbed to asthma, and the one whose memory, more than anyone else, he wanted to honour with a fine performance in Egypt.

That night, in Cairo, ZiKeeper did just that.

His Cedric was just seven at the time of his death.

To God Be The Glory!

Peace to the GEPA Chief, the Big Fish, George Norton and all the Chakariboys in the struggle.

Come on United!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bruno, Bruno, Bruno, Bruno, Bruno, Bruno!

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You can also interact with me on Twitter — @Chakariboy, Facebook, Instagram — sharukor and every Wednesday night, at 9.45pm, when I join the legendary Charles “CNN’’ Mabika and producer Craig “Master Craig’’ Katsande on the ZBC television magazine programme, “Game Plan”