By Walter Broeckx
This morning when I drove to work I heard on the radio that in Colombia a plane had crashed and that on this plane was the selection of Chapecoense. A Brazilian team that was on its way to play the final of the Copa Sudamericano. What we would call the Europa League final over here.
The plane didn’t reach its destination that would have been the airport of Meddelin in Colombia.
81 passengers were on board and only 6 survived.
Amongst the survivors they have counted 3 of the football players of Chapecoense. As far as I can find defender Alan Ruschel and the keepers Danilo and Jakson Follmann are the lucky ones. But then again in what condition are they and will they ever recover from their injuries?
In other words almost the whole selection of the club has been killed.
At times like this one can only sit back and feel the pain of the players and their families who have to live on after this tragedy.
I had written an article about the referee and how they can work. It all seems so meaningless at this moment in time.
When a whole club has been whipped of the face of the earth I didn’t feel like publishing it.
As Per Mertesacker wrote in his reaction : something we do almost every week (stepping on a plane) has now suddenly turned in to a disaster.
We take it all for granted that planes will carry us safe from point A to point B. And then it all goes wrong. And when it goes wrong it is mostly a terrible ending.
I was trying to imagine how I would react if such a thing would happen to Arsenal. And after a few seconds I thought it was better not even to try to imagine such a tragedy.
I’m sorry for not putting up any Arsenal related post at this moment but I really don’t feel that this is important right now.
I think the whole football world is schocked by this tragedy and tears have no colours.
My thoughts go out to those young man who only recently celebrated reaching the final and the excitement they must have felt on reaching the final. And then now reaching that final will have cost most of them their lives. Live can be cruel at times.
My thoughts also go out to those unkown victims of the crash. Because they will not have the support from the rest of the world. They probably remain unknown victims of the crash that will be remembered for always as the crash that killed almost a whole football team.
Such a tragedy should remind us how fragile live is and quickly we could face the end. And should remind us of enjoying live as much as we can when we can. It reminds me once again that I don’t want to waste my live by moaning about things that don’t go our way. It reminds me of enjoying the things that do go my way.
To all the victims of todays disaster flight in Colombia I can only hope that they may rest in peace.
And whoever is flying at the moment: please have a save journey.
I had read earlier, that one member of the team was not on the flight for some reason. Perhaps he was sick?
But it seems an entire team was wiped out.
RIP
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There is still a game to play? What are the rules if the visiting team cannot make it to the game?
Can the Brazilian league send in a team of volunteers to play as a proxy?
I don’t speak or read either Spanish or Portuguese, but I don’t see anything at CONMEBOL or CBF on the plane crash.
Gord
I doubt that anybody has considered the procedure for completing the tie at this moment.
First of all, let me say my condolence greetings to the bereaved families of all those passengers who lost their lives in that ill fated aircraft flight from Brazil to Colombia. Let their souls rest in our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
And let the Lord in His enduring mercies forever, grant the bereaved the fortitude to bear their the lost. And also have His mercies on those who have suffered injuries from the crash a soothing and painless injuries recovering period during their treatments and rehabilitation.
Aircraft tragedy comes, aircraft tragedy goes and aircraft tredegy is remembered. But the living goes on living. This is the 2nd time and the 3rd time I’ve heard and read of aircraft crash tragedies involving football teams. The 1st I’ve read of, is the Munich aircraft crash which took the lives of some Manchester United football team and the entourage who were returning from a Champions League match. The second one I heard of, was when the whole Zambia national football team going to Afcon and other passengers on board lost their lives in an air crash off the Gabones coast. And the 3rd one is this one that’d involved the lost of the Brazilian football players on their ways to Colombia. But one thing seems to be common in these 3 air crashes. The air flight were all chartered.
I think most professional football clubs especially the big ones like Arsenal now have their own aircraft which they now use in traveling to places outside the country of their football League to play matches like the Ucl and Eropa League.
The owning of their own aircraft by the big professional football clubs in Europe in particular is very good. For, it can help reduce the risk of accidents and it’s worth emulating by other clubs around the world. I know Man Utd had one during Sir Alex Ferguson reign which was used to bring back Roy Kean from a World Cup tournament somewhere. Do Arsenal have one? If they haven’t yet, let them please start to have their own executive Jet.
In furtherance to my starts and bench for our home ELC match against Southampton, and due to the facts that Olivier Giroud whom I’ve started has a groin problem as Le Prof has revealed today to Arsenal player, and going by the facts that Ben Sheaf and Chris Willock who I also have in my starts & on my bench for this match stared for our Under23 team yesternight. And I have also heard the saying of Le Prof to Arsenal player that 90% of his selection for this game will be from the senior team squad. Consequently, I am compelled to review my starts and bench for this match which I posted on this site on Monday.
My reversed starts and bench are as below.
My starts:
Martinez
Jenkinson? Holding Paulista Gibbs
Coquellan Xhaka
Oxchambo Ramsey Iwobi
Perez.
My bench:
Ospina Maitland-Niles Koscielny Monreal MohElneny Ozil StephyMavididi.
My starts are all 1st teammers. While my bench has only 2 Under21 players of Niles & Mavididi on it. 10% of 18 man match day squad is 2, team wise.
I feel the news has shocked the CONMEBOL and to expect a quicker reaction to resolving resolving a winner is not to appreciate the grief that is pervading that association now. My heart goes out to the families and everyone else affected by this tragedy. It is not something to wish for or try to guess how fans of teams involved are going to react. It is hard!
Akin, the truth is that acquiring a private plane (Arsenal does have one, while Emirates are happy to provide a bigger, branded plane when needed) doesn’t remove the risks that is flying in an aeroplane. One pilot error; a bolt not in place; smoke in the cabin, engine failure, etc. All these can result in tragedy in the air. May God keep us and our loved ones from anything this tragic until He calls us to Himself.
I wrote what follows many hours ago, I didn’t want to poison the thread, so held off submitting. And editing/adding happened as well.
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I have read that 2 defenders and a goalkeeper survived. A “journalist” covering the team was also a survivor. Apparently the goalkeeper needed to have a leg amputated. He will not be playing football any more.
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The FA, UEFA and FIFA (and similar organisations) are filled with people getting paid salaries 10 (or in the case of FIFA maybe 100) times what they are worth, doing nothing most of the time. They should have thought of this.
I had run across one report that suggested the Championship be given to the team that died.
A related problem, is what does one do in the event of a team returning from such a game? I suspect this problem has been thought of a little, but probably not extensively.
Just before submitting this new note, I revisited CONMEBOL and CBF websites. I still see nothing about this tragedy. It could be because I don’t know enough Spanish/Portuguese/Latin to guess at where to look.
Of course there is more, once you hit submit. I first posted about this incident at 12:30 my time (not quite 24 hours ago). The news was already 2 hours old at that point.
Now, nearly 24 hours later, CONMEBOL and CBF have no excuses.
It was a sad day indeed . Their loss to their town , families and friends cannot even be estimated . May the survivors recover fast and fully , while may those left behind find solace .RIP.
I heard that one of the surviving players has lost both his legs…
Please God guide those that have lost loved ones & those that have witnessed the trauma & survive. Brazil you are in my prayers to bless all those that have suffered through this sad accident.