Chapter 158: The Curse of the South Changing Room
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
When Nottingham Forest was in the midst of training hard for their first EFL Cup championship title in twelve years, an absolutely disadvantageous piece of news was heard from the EFL Cup committee. The committee had announced the allocation results of the two teams' changing rooms.
According to the rule, "Northern teams will use the North changing room, while Southern teams will use the South changing room". Middlesbrough, which was located even more to the North than Nottingham Forest, obtained the right to use the North changing room. Nottingham Forest, on the other hand, could only helplessly accept what fate had arranged for them — to use the "cursed" South changing room at Cardiff Millennium Stadium.
Once this news was announced, Nottingham's local press erupted with complaints. The majority of them lamented about fate not being fair, and placed much emphasis on fatalism.
There were also a minority of them, who felt that this new rule of changing rooms was not logical. And that, instead, it should be abolished, and the allocation of rooms should be decided the "old-fashioned" way, via balloting.
Of contrary opinion, Middlesbrough's side was overjoyed. Aside from the local media's advocating strongly that fate had treated its team well, they also did not forget to seize the opportunity to strike at their opponent's confidence.
They were opposed to the idea of changing this rule, because Middlesbrough City was one of the most northern cities in England. The only two teams, which were located even more to the North than Middlesbrough, and that also had the abilities to advance into this kind of Cup final, were probably only Newcastle and Sunderland.
The evidence, which they had provided to refute Nottingham's press, appeared to be extremely convincing. Before the 2002 FA Cup finals match, Chelsea and Arsenal had both advanced into the finals. Although both teams were based in London City, which was located in the south of England, Arsenal was based in North London, while Chelsea was based in West London. Hence, with Chelsea being located closer to the south, they had to use that south changing room.
It was noteworthy to know that, in the eighteen months prior to this, Cardiff Millennium Stadium, which replaced the under-construction Wembley Stadium, had hosted finals of various competitions (including FA Cup, FA Community Shield, EFL Cup, League One and below playoffs and elimination matches). Among these, all of the teams that used the south changing room had, without exception, lost in each of their respective matches. Cardiff Millennium Stadium's south changing room was, therefore, deemed to be a cursed changing room.
Chelsea was naturally dissatisfied with losing such an important match, as a result of what was dubbed the "North-South fate", and therefore, protested against the Football Association. The Football Association decided to use a coin toss to determine the allocation of the changing room, and in the end, Chelsea was still allocated the South changing room.
In order to counteract the "curse of the south changing room", all of the Chelsea players had worn their "lucky white socks" during the match. But, in the end, they had lost to Arsenal in the finals, with a score of 0:2, and the players scoring for Arsenal were Parlour and Ljungberg.
By using Chelsea as an example, Middlesbrough's press was trying to tell Nottingham Forest's press that, in the face of the almighty fate, you should just stop struggling on your deathbed! Hence, even if they determined the room allocation by coin toss, you will still get the south changing room, and you will still lose to us, the mighty Middlesbrough!
In their minds, this was a result that was predetermined!
As soon as the changing room allocation was announced, Tang En felt that they still stood a chance — one that he could make good use of. As for how to use it, that would have to depend on the specific situation.
Tang En had heard tales about Cardiff Millennium Stadium long ago, when he was still a football fan. It was truly quite a severe spot. Out of the seventeen matches held there, fourteen of them were won by teams which had used the north changing room, and only three were won by those which used the south changing room.
Among the three wins, two of them were obtained by Arsenal, while the third victory was a promotion playoffs match in League Two, which had little significance. The team that had obtained the victory while using the south changing room was Stoke City. However, three wins were still unable to change the majority mindset that "Cardiff Millennium Stadium's south changing room was inauspicious", and that there was a valid reason for it.
Before Stoke City and Arsenal's victory, Cardiff Millennium Stadium specially invited a Fengshui master from China to resolve the issue for them. In the end, after switching the placement of some of the things in the room, and inviting Welsh artist Andrew Vicari to draw a seven-inch long wall painting, depicting a phoenix, galloping horses, and a sun to shield against the curse, Stoke City and Arsenal managed to attain victory.
However, right when people thought that the curse had been completely dispelled by Arsenal, they lost to Manchester United in the FA Community Shield. Since then, the lore and legend of Cardiff Millennium Stadium's south changing room curse have continued….
The curse's impact on the team was definitely not something to be overlooked. Football players were mostly superstitious, which could explain why there were many weird rules, such as women not being allowed in the same car as the football team. There were even more instances of small, personal superstitions, such as stepping into the field with the right foot, some managers always wearing their lucky ties… etcetera.
Tang En was originally not a superstitious person, but thinking from the perspective of the entire team, he had to be superstitious for once. At this time, if Tang En said things like "Curses are all bluffs! Those are superstitions not backed by science! Ability is the foundation for winning matches" to the players, nobody would actually believe him.
There was something, in this case, that was extremely advantageous for Tang En — his love for Chinese culture was a fact well-known by the entire Nottingham City, especially within the team. In addition, the person who temporarily dispelled the curse of Cardiff Millennium Stadium also happened to be a Chinese Fengshui master, a fact that was also known throughout England.
Therefore, in order for the team to not lose, in terms of psychological warfare, before the match even started, it was necessary for Tang En to pretend, and put up a show! Hence, when he was being interviewed by the reporters, Tang En appeared to be extremely confident towards the match, and completely showed no signs of worry regarding the south changing room "curse".
Not only that, but he also spoke casually about Cardiff Millennium Stadium's invitation to the Fengshui master to dispel the curse. Pearce Bruce cleverly guessed Tang En's hidden agenda, and therefore, wrote this in the following day's :
"…Manager Twain mentioned inviting a Fengshui master to dispel the curse. On top of that, we all know that he personally loves Chinese culture. It was rumored that his Chinese teacher had brought back from China a mysterious gift for him, and he has never told anyone else what it was. Exactly what kind of "mysterious gift" was it, we wonder?"
In answer to this thinly veiled query regarding the gift, actually, there was nothing mysterious about it! It was merely a set of traditional Chinese costumes. As Tang En told Yang Yan that he liked traditional Chinese culture, Yang Yan went home and decided that buying a traditional Chinese costume for Tang En would be most appropriate.
Moreover, she also wanted to see how a westerner, especially one with such a high nose bridge and white skin, would look when wearing a traditional Chinese costume. However, because of the nature of Tang En's work, he was required to be in a suit almost all-year round. Hence, that set of traditional Chinese costumes was left hanging inside his closet.
Fortunately, the traditional Chinese costume that Yang Yan bought for Tang En was not flowery and bright-colored, or else Tang En would be too embarrassed to use it as a Taoist priest's robe…. Although the westerners would not be able to tell the difference, but, still, an actor's tool had to be slightly more professional.
As for the other important tools which he needed, Tang En had no choice but to ask Yang Yan for her help again, to try and see if there were any Fengshui compasses for sale around Manchester's Chinatown. Tang En thought that some traditional items would be much more well-preserved in places like Chinatown, as opposed to in mainland China. Something like a Fengshui compass should be very easily found in Chinatown.
Yang Yan asked Tang En why he needed a Fengshui compass, so he told Yang Yan his plans. Over the phone, Yang Yan smiled happily, exclaiming, "Mr Twain, I look forward to your shaman dance on the television!"
They were currently able to directly converse in Mandarin, so Yang Yan was not afraid that Tang En did not understand what "shaman dance" meant. After conversing a while, Yang Yan continued to ask, "Can putting up a show, and doing such gimmicks, also help to win matches?"
"Hmm, this question is difficult to answer. But you can treat this as part my job of fine-tuning the team psychologically…"
"Hearing you say it like this, being a football manager seems to be very interesting!"
"Hehe, the team's changing room is even more interesting. However, I'm really sorry that I'm unable to share with you these stories."
Tang En was not wrong in saying such a thing. To an outsider, a changing room was a very mysterious place, and there were many interesting and fun happenings taking place inside it every day.
The players and managers treated this place as their private venue, and no outsiders were allowed to probe into it. There were many unspoken rules in the football industry, and "nobody in the team is allowed to divulge anything that takes place in the changing room" was one.
Although Tang En was the manager of the team, he also could not violate this rule. Otherwise, he would lose his players' trusts, and his colleagues' respects. A manager, who could not control the team, was viewed as being no different from trash.
Two days after speaking to Yang Yan on the phone, right before Tang En was about to lead the team to Cardiff, he received an express delivery parcel, sent from Manchester. Opening the parcel, Tang En discovered that it was exactly the Fengshui compass that he needed.
Chinese characters and the symbol of eight trigrams were engraved all over it. It was a Fengshui compass that appeared very mysterious in the eyes of westerners.
Having obtained such an item, Tang En was confident that he could intimidate everyone by using it. When the time came, it would definitely cause an uproar among the English media. The sheer thought of his impending successful mischief made Tang En chuckle.
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Cardiff, the capital of Wales, was where Cardiff Millennium Stadium, which hosted the EFL Cup finals' match venue, was located. It was not considered as being too far from Nottingham. For Middlesbrough to arrive there for the match, they had to take an airplane, while Nottingham Forest only had to take the bus.
On the bus, the players' morale was low. Evidently, they had been scared by that "south changing room curse". Quite a handful of them felt that this was an inauspicious sign, signalling that the team's defeat was imminent.
A football team was a combined entity. One person with such a though could very well affect two other people. From there, two people then could easily turn to four people, four people to eight people, eight people to sixteen people…and so on. In the end, no matter if one said "those are just baseless nonsense", they would still question themselves, wondering, "Is the curse real? Will we really lose the match, all because we used the south changing room?"
As the saying went, "Repeat a lie enough times, and it will be believed", this was the same rationale behind the Chinese teams'"koreaphobia". They were originally equally matched, in terms of ability, and it wasn't much of a big deal to lose to them a few times.
However, after the press proposed the idea of "koreaphobia", as well as promoted its propagation, in the end, even the Chinese teams themselves felt that they were born fearing the Korean teams. This was in spite of the fact that they were a team comprised solely of players born after 1989, and they were not even born when "koreaphobia" first started out. This, however, still did not change the fact that they were equally "afraid of Korea".
Tang En knew very well about how terrifying words could be, just from looking at these silent players on the bus. In the past, everyone used to talk a lot and crack jokes on their way to the matches.
He knew that it was impossible for them to win with this mental state. Before the match even started, his team had already lost to the opponent, in terms of its morale and desire for victory. How were they, then, supposed to put up a good fight in the match later on? This cannot carry on, so thank goodness, Tang En had long made preparations for such a situation as this.
The coach bus driver was in the midst of driving attentively, until he suddenly discovered that there was someone else beside him. He turned his head around to see, and discovered that the person beside him was the team's manager, Mr. Tony Twain. He held a disc in his hand, which he was inserting into the bus's DVD player. As he only glanced up for a split second, he could only catch a glimpse of the disc cover, which seemed to have the words "85' LIVE AID" written on it.
After inserting the disc into the player, Tang En continued to dabble with some of its settings. Afterwards, he took the remote controller and stood near the front bus door. At this moment, the players were either keeping quiet with their heads lowered, or they were looking outside the window, as though they had a lot on their minds. Seeing this, Tang En pressed the play button.
Suddenly, the audio system on the bus started blasting loud noises, without any warning. They sounded like the loud buzzing, cheering, clapping and jeering noises heard at the stadium's stands, all mixed together. As a result of this sudden wave of loud noises, everyone in the bus jumped in shock.
After the loud noises gradually died down, what soon followed was a series of drumbeats with a very familiar rhythm. All the players on the bus raised their heads, somewhat shocked.
This was part of the song performed by Queen in 1985 at Hyde Park, during a charity concert aimed at helping Africa and raising public awareness for the African regions, which were the ones that needed assistance the most. That concert had been voted by music critics as being the most noble live rock concert in history.
The song tune which followed closely behind the drumbeats was indeed that famous song, . This was a classic rhythm, one that could make people become excited. By then, Tang En had noticed that there were already some players moving to the beat.
was very short, and the song that came on after that was something that everyone was even more familiar with, . This version of the song was different from the one produced in the recording studio. It was a live version, and was even more passionate, as Freddie Mercury's (Queen's lead singer) delivery was much more explosive.
Afterwards, Tang En spoke with this music playing in the background.
"I intend to add a new rule to the team — in the future, whenever we go to Cardiff Millennium Stadium and Wembley Stadium for matches, we will play this song on the coach bus. Look at all of your shocked expressions…. Do you think that this is the only time in our whole lives that we're going there?" Tang En smiled, then continued, "The EFL Cup is merely the beginning. There will be many, many more matches waiting for us. And there are many, many more championship trophies waiting for us to clinch. Hence, I feel that there is a need to set such a tradition. Alright, lads, stop looking so gloomy. I know what you guys are worried about, but I think that there's completely no need for you guys to worry about that."
He continued, "You think that at Cardiff Millennium Stadium, the teams that used its south changing room cannot win. This kind of curse has already been around for quite a long time. But this curse is not completely infallible. You guys should have heard of Arsenal and Stoke City, right? When they emerged victorious from their matches, the changing room assigned to them was precisely the south changing room."
"But, Boss," the honest Huth raised his hand and said, "that is because they hired that… that…. that…."
He continued saying "that" for quite some time, but was still unable to say the term which came after. In the end, everyone started smiling as a result.
Tang En had originally turned his head around to hear what he had to say, but seeing that the German really could not come up with that term, Tang En could only say it on behalf of him. "Fengshui master. They hired a fengshui master from China to temporarily dispel the curse of the south changing room," he defined.
Huth nodded his head vigorously, expressing that that was indeed what he had wanted to say. The rest of the people on the bus also played along. Tang En unfolded his arms, then whipped out an item from behind his back, as though he was performing a magic trick. "Does anyone know what this is?" he asked.
The item in his hand was indeed the Fengshui compass. There wouldn't be anyone, who would know what that was, so everyone was shaking their heads while looking at it in Tang En's hand.
"I reckon that everyone should know about my finding a Chinese teacher to learn mandarin, and that my results were quite good, right?"
Everyone nodded their heads.
"Very well, as Fengshui is also part of traditional Chinese culture, I happen to know about it as well," Tang En said unashamedly, as he put on his "Fengshui master" hat. In reality, even when Tang En was still in China, he had little knowledge on Fengshui, and much less now. "This is a Fengshui compass. In china, it is used to assess Fengshui, and to dispel ominous curses."
Upon hearing Tang En's words, the look in the players' eyes also changed. Quite a few people looked at their manager with a shocked look, as though they still had some doubts about it.
Tang En's face displayed an extremely confident smile. "Why? Have I ever lied to you guys?" Tang En discovered that he was really very well-suited to "act"….and wondered why hadn't he discovered this talent of his in the past? "Whenever I say that we will win, have we ever lost?" he continued to probe.
"No!" The players replied at the same time. This was something they were extremely proud of. Ever since Tony Twain took over this team in the middle of the season, Nottingham Forest had yet to experience defeat in their matches.
"Isn't that right? Rest assured, I will definitely be able to dispel the curse of the south changing room by the match day! Therefore, there's no need for you guys to worry about some curse. Moreover, I think that.. perhaps after the finals, the press might even start reporting about a "north changing room curse"!"
Everyone — including that coach bus driver, who had been attentively driving, started laughing out loud.
"That's the way, that's the way! This is the true Nottingham Forest!" they guffawed.
The music was still playing from the audio system, and the passionate voice of the lead singer from the most noble band in English rock history continued to envelop the entire bus.
"We are the champions! My friends! We are the champions! And we'll keep on fighting 'til the end! We are the champions! We are the — champions of the world!"