Fourth-Tier Soccer Club, Grimsby Town, Takes Down Manchester United, And The Lads Go Absolutely Bonkers With A Proper Pitch Invasion
Shaun Botterill. Getty Images.Soccer still gets shit on a decent amount here in America for being a soft sport. And while speaking about the physicality of the game, that may be true. But mentally speaking? It might be the most ruthless sport of them all because of all these random tournaments they have throughout the season where teams from different levels all get a chance to play against each other.
The Carabao Cup is an annual tournament that features teams from the Premier League, and then the next 3 divisions of English Football. So you have the Championship League, League One, and League Two. Grimsby Town Football Club currently plays in League Two. Manchester United is one of the biggest football clubs in the world. Just to give you an idea of the David vs Goliath we've got going on here--Man United's salary is £769 million, while Grimsby Town's salary is £3.1 million. There are players on Manchester United who make 20 times as much as Grimsby Town's entire squad. And what does that do for Manchester United?
Just makes for an extremely expensive upset.
There's no American Football equivalent to this, but I guess it would be like if the Dallas Cowboys played a game against an Arena Football team and lost. It would be like if the Montreal Canadiens lost to a team from the ECHL. Like if BizNasty rolled up with the Wheeling Nailers to take down the Habs in a shootout. Or if the New York Yankees lost to the Fayeteville Woodpeckers single-A team.
The thing is that no NFL or MLB or NHL team would ever risk putting their athletes out in a game like that. Mainly because you'd assume it wouldn't be a fair competition, the majority of those games would all be ass kickings, and not worth playing in the first place. But…there's also always that small, minuscule chance that a humiliating loss like this happens, and now everybody thinks you're a joke.
While it might be the lowest of lows for Man United, what a moment that has to be for the Grimsby Town supporters. Just a small little fishing town with a small little fourth-tier team to root for all year long. And now here they are taking the biggest spotlight in the soccer world after pulling off one of the biggest upsets ever. That's one of those stories you tell for the rest of your life if you were in the crowd for that match. Where generations from now, your son will be telling his son that his dad was in the crowd for that game. And on the other side of the story, Manchester United fans will all have to watch their grandchildren become Liverpool supporters.