When the announcement of the Queen’s death came on Thursday evening, for some time there was no reaction from Liverpool Football Club.
As often happens these days, into that void poured opinions, emotions and outlandish conspiracy theories. Nothing is just let be any more.
Liverpool made no comment, it was speculated, because the club was terrified of upsetting its fans, who hate the monarchy. Then, at 8.10pm, a photograph of the Queen handing the trophy to Liverpool captain Ron Yeats at the 1965 FA Cup final appeared with the message: ‘Liverpool Football Club is saddened by the passing of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II. We extend our sincere condolences to The Royal Family.’
Simple, respectful and entirely appropriate. So what happened in the intervening time?
It is disrespectful to suggest Liverpool fans cannot be trusted to behave in a minute’s silence
There will be a minute’s silence to mark the death of Queen Elizabeth II at the age of 96
Liverpool obeyed protocol and process. The club made no comment because there is a directive, part of Operation London Bridge, reminding that the correct procedure is for no official statements to be made until after the Prime Minister has spoken. Liz Truss appeared outside Downing Street roughly one hour after the news broke and Liverpool waited a respectful short while after that.
Not all football clubs and institutions did. Some ignored instructions. That is their decision. Yet Liverpool is a club where processes around mourning, remembrance and commemoration matter. It knows how to behave in the right way in the darkest times. Liverpool, more often than not, get it right.
So on Tuesday night, UEFA permitting, there will be a minute’s silence before the Champions League match with Ajax and it will no doubt be impeccably observed.
The suggestion that football was postponed at the weekend because Anfield could not be trusted to behave appropriately is an insult to the club and its supporters.
The booing of the national anthem during two Wembley finals last year was a commentary on the state, not the monarch.
Liverpool feels left behind. The city feels a sense of grievance over not just the cover-up that followed Hillsborough, but many and varied socio-economic factors. It blames successive governments. God Save The Queen, as it was, is a symbol of our nation state.
If Liverpool get to Wembley this season, the anthem will probably be booed by a section of the crowd again and some will think that very wrong, but the anthem is different to a minute of remembrance. There is no history of Liverpool supporters targeting the Queen personally, far less of them sullying a moment such as this.
There has never been a question of the club failing to hold a minute’s silence to mark her death at its first home game and no question of it moving away from proper observance into the unconventional or non-committal.
Nobody is interpreting this through the medium of jazz dance. The fans may feel Scouse not English, but Liverpool will do what needs to be done, what has to be done, as will every football club.
Football has been criticised for postponing its fixtures last weekend and, looking at the poignant ceremonies that took place at The Oval and Doncaster racecourse, it does seem an opportunity missed.
Liverpool as a club is one that knows how to behave in the right way in the darkest times
Equally, it can be argued that no sport is as big as football and in no other industry does the slightest mis-step have such ferocious and public ramifications.
So football feared causing offence by playing on and went early, believing other sports would follow suit. When they didn’t, it was left exposed.
Yet those who make judgment calls at Liverpool will confirm the complexities of grave situations. Last month, after nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel was murdered in Dovecot, to the east of the city, the club drew criticism for not holding a pre-match minute of silence, or remembrance.
The explanation for its stance on tragic, luckless Olivia was straight- forward — Liverpool had not been asked to. Had the family requested, it would have been done.
Yet Liverpool would not presume to insert the club into a bereavement, or to intrude by contacting the family unsolicited. It isn’t about them. So it is hard to judge right and wrong from the outside.
Back to Tuesday night and what affords the certainty that the proper mood will be struck? Past experience.
On February 10, 2008, Manchester United commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Munich air disaster and some firestarter at the Premier League scheduled the visit of Manchester City for that weekend.
The preceding week was consumed by dread, the fear that City supporters would defile a solemn occasion for their rivals. All week, messages were sent and reinforced in the hope of preventing a disrespectful and unforgivable pandemonium.
Yet on the day, nothing. City supporters held up blue and white scarves to compliment their hosts’ red and white. A pin drop would have echoed around Old Trafford, such was the reverential quiet.
Liverpool fans observed a minute’s applause in April 2022 to show support for Manchester United’s Cristiano Ronaldo as he mourned the loss of his newborn son
And then, when the match began, City treated United with no respect whatsoever – just how it should be – and won 2-1. Some observers felt United had almost been declawed by the courtesy and consideration shown before the game.
Forward to earlier this year when Liverpool played Manchester United at Anfield the day after it was announced that Cristiano Ronaldo and wife Georgina had lost their newborn son. Ronaldo did not play but, in the seventh minute, Liverpool supporters began applauding to show solidarity with the player and his family at such a sad time.
There is no less popular club with Liverpool supporters than Manchester United and few less popular players than Ronaldo. Yet that was put aside in a collective show of empathy and humanity. And this is the crowd that is going to ruin a minute’s silence for Queen Elizabeth II?
Largely, football supporters get it. Away from the banter and the blinkers, most people who attend football realise when a moment is too important for tribal rivalries or wider emotions to encroach.
They know this at Liverpool most of all because a vicious circle of vile disrespect has been allowed to taint commemorations of the dead of Hillsborough and Munich.
It hardly matters who started it – both sides will blame each other – but songs about Liverpool’s supposed victim mentality and gestures signifying a plane crash are common whenever the Manchester United fixture is played.
It is unedifying, upsetting – and if the minute’s silence was tarnished on Tuesday it would further risk pariah status. And who wants that?
No one likes us, we don’t care, became a rallying cry at Millwall, but is it really true?
Every club seeks appreciation, respect, if not love, from neutral observers. Imagine the horrible vortex of abuse between Manchester United and Liverpool replicated at every ground? What purpose would it serve?
Premier League football was put on hold last weekend following the death of Queen Elizabeth
And, yes, there’s 50,000 people in the stadium. It is hard to vouch for the common sense, empathy and sobriety of them all.
At the Theatre Royal, Bath, on Friday, during the minute’s silence it was possible to observe four people in the stalls who remained seated.
One of them was also the loudest and most demonstrative audience member when the production concluded, so maybe she just liked being noticed. The point is, it didn’t reflect on the theatre that a handful did not stand. It’s a free country and they weren’t disruptive.
There are times, though, when if you can’t say anything nice, best not say anything at all, and one of those times is now.
It is why there has been such a backlash against the likes of Trevor Sinclair and Jedward. Not because there can never be discussions about colonialism or abolition – both are valid topics, whatever your view – but because when the much-loved Queen has just died, people are not in the mood for a poorly-considered hot take on Twitter.
It is possible to be a republican and respect duty, responsibility and service, or to respect the feelings of others, or that a family, no matter their status, has just lost its matriarch. That is what many Labour MPs who are not monarchists have been doing.
‘My thoughts are with the Queen’s family as they come to terms with their personal loss, as well as those here and around the world who will mourn her death,’ wrote Jeremy Corbyn. ‘I enjoyed discussing our families, gardens and jam-making with her. May she rest in peace.’ His tweet appeared, obediently, after the Prime Minister’s speech on Thursday.
Jordan Henderson, Liverpool’s captain, travelled to Liverpool town hall on Monday and signed the book of condolence. Jurgen Klopp said he supported the minute’s silence but added Liverpool’s fans did not need any guidance from him on how to show respect.
He’s right, of course. Tonight, the club of Sir Kenny Dalglish – his title duly noted – will fall silent, because its people will know what to do.
FOOTBALL CAUGHT BY SURPRISE
Maybe now football sees its error in postponing the schedule, with some marquee fixtures under threat this weekend, too.
By making the game expendable it is left open to outside pressure.
Fixtures at Chelsea and Manchester United have now fallen. Yet the Queen was 96. Her passing was not unanticipated. It is not unthinkable that amid Operation London Bridge football could have come up with a direct plan of action to be implemented with minimal need for meetings and discussion. It could even have been run past the Government and the Palace for approval. Instead, it was caught by surprise.
ROTTER SERGIO RUBS SALT IN THE WOUNDS
What a complete rotter, Sergio Garcia.
The most boastful, if not the biggest, of the LIV Golf team, he took up a place at the PGA Championship at Wentworth and then withdrew on Thursday without explanation. By Saturday he was photographed grinning at the college football match between Alabama Crimson Tide and Texas Longhorns.
His place could have gone to a more deserving PGA Tour player who would have stayed the distance. No wonder the rebels are unpopular.
Sergio Garcia did not win any friends by withdrawing from PGA Championship at Wentworth
Garcia posed for a photo as he attended a college football match in Texas on Saturday
JUST NOT CRICKET TO CONJURE A RESULT
Strange that there are those who attend sport, love sport, yet still don’t appreciate that sport has rules. Yes, it was hugely inconvenient and disappointing that England were not allowed to beat South Africa on Sunday night, and to fall 33 runs short while scoring at a rate of 5.7 per over upset many. Another six overs would have done it.
Yet the umpires took a reading before coming off for bad light on Saturday, and that then stands as the mark for the rest of the Test.
Imagine if they had played on, England had won, and then it had rained all day on Monday. South Africa would, rightly, have said they were denied a drawn Test and therefore a drawn series. Nobody could know, for certain, that there would be play on the final day. South Africa had to be given their chance to get lucky. It is not for the umpires to manufacture a result.
Bad light saw play brought to an end on Sunday at the Oval but it was a sporting decision
That is what happened at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix last year and it cost Lewis Hamilton his record-breaking eighth drivers’ championship.
On Sunday, Max Verstappen won in Monza behind a safety car to the fury of all, with Hamilton wondering why last season’s finale was the first and only time F1 has veered from its rules.
He has a point. All sides sign up to a set of protocols before the start and it cannot just be that these get randomly altered to manufacture a spectacle.
What happened at the Oval wasn’t crowd pleasing; but it was most certainly sporting.
DON’T TORTURE OFFICIALS LIKE HERETICS
Premier League clubs are increasingly insistent that referees conduct post-match interviews to explain their decisions and mistakes after the game.
There is one problem with this: who says they made mistakes?
The presumption here, from managers and players too, is that referees will accept responsibility under questioning — although quite what good this will do, beyond vengeful vindication for the supposedly wronged club, has never been explained.
Asking referees to explain their decisions in post-match interviews doesn’t mean they will suddenly change their minds. (Pictured: Andy Madley being quizzed by West Ham players)
Yet take West Ham’s disallowed goal at Chelsea, a judgment the majority of observers saw as erroneous. What if the referee does not agree? What if Andy Madley comes before the cameras and sticks by it? Says that Jarred Gillett, the VAR, drew his attention to a foul he had missed and he stands by that decision? How many times is the replay reviewed before we accept he has simply made a call that differs to ours?
It’s an interview, not an Inquisition. We can’t torture officials like heretics until they recant. Throw it open to the studio, get the guests involved, it’s an argument that goes absolutely nowhere unless the referee is prepared to change his mind. And, even if he does, then what? The game has gone, the final whistle has blown.
So while the event itself would be modern and new – and television would love it because it makes them the centre of the universe again – in terms of benefit for the game, there is little. Much like VAR really.