HT Kick Off: This time for Asia

Hindustan Times

a day ago

Mehdi Taremi sticks out his right leg and finds Davide Fratessi who bends one past Wojciech Szczęsny. A small step for the Iranian, a giant leap for Inter? Because it is the goal that helps the team from Milan enter Champions League final, their second in three seasons. With Paris St-Germain taming Arsenal in the other semi-final, it means that in Munich on Saturday there will be a Champions League winner, from Asia.
Like Taremi, attacking midfielder Lee Kang-in has struggled for minutes at PSG but who knows, the South Korean may well turn out for be the hero in the club's search for the holy grail. Lee, 24, has six goals and six assists in a season he has mostly been used from the bench. In 462 minute of Champions League action, Lee has no goal or assist.
Taremi's numbers are better in Europe as Simone Inzaghi has used the Iranian centre-forward as impact sub. Apart from the assist in the second-leg of the semi-final, Taremi, 32, has three more in this season's Champions League and has scored one goal, against Red Star in the group stage.
An Asian winning the UEFA Champions League has happened only once before when Park Ji-sung featured in the Manchester United squad that beat Chelsea in the 2007-08 final. A final, Park did not play. Alex Ferguson has said he regretted the decision to not play the hard-working South Korean midfielder for long after. Park played in the 2009 and 2011 final both of which ended in defeats to Barcelona.
It takes a lot of adjustment, not the least of which is breaking the language barrier, when a player from Asia shifts to Europe. Over the years though the profile of the Asian footballer has risen, the numbers growing rapidly following Indonesia's naturalisation policy. At €50m, as per Transfermarkt, Real Sociedad's Takefusa Kubo is the most expensive Asian player in the Big Five. Last season, two Asian players, Lee and Kim Min-jae, were among the losing semi-finalists in the Champions League.
Even off the pitch, with ownership of top clubs fetching seats at European football's high table, Asia's influence has been growing steadily. The Saudi Arabia Pro League then did what China had some years back: lure Europeans to Asia. Who would have thought Aymeric Laporte and N'Golo Kante would play in a European Championship semi-final while representing clubs in Asia.
Ali Daei, Takashi Usami and Takumi Minamino have been unused subs in Champions League finals, all of them playing for teams that had lost. Daei was a Bayern Munich forward in the 'football-bloody-hell' final in Barcelona. Also with Bayern, Usami was part of the campaign in 2011-12 when they lost to Chelsea. Minamino was with Liverpool when Real beat them.
None of them will be Asia's most famous footballer to have lost a Champions League final. That distinction, if we can call it that, belongs to Son Heung-min. Son, 32, played every minute of the 2018-19 final won 2-0 by Liverpool. In 10 years, Son scored 173 goals and played 451 matches for Tottenham Hotspur but it was not till his 452nd, also the Europa League final, that he could break his and the club's trophy duck.
'We've been talking about this for years. The biggest reason I stayed at Tottenham was because I wanted to do something others couldn't achieve,' Son had said before the final.
A season that had Asian players feature in three of Big Five league winning teams, and the Europa League winners, will end with one from the continent having his hands on the Champions League after 17 years.