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I had been standing up for the last 15 minutes crying my eyes out, and I felt empty inside. There were only five minutes left on the clock, and Manchester City was down 2-1 to Queens Park Rangers in the final game of the season. Manchester City had to win this game to win the most prestigious soccer league in the world, the Premier League in England, and I was there.

“If they win the title from here, I don’t think it’ll ever be topped,” commentator of the game, Martin Tyler, said.

Ten years ago, I went on a trip to England with my dad to watch my favorite team, Manchester City play in the final game of the season. I had never watched any big European teams live. It was by far the best gift that I had ever received, and not only did I get to watch my favorite team play, but I also got to watch them play a game that could win them the Premier League. I remember waiting in line to get into the stadium and to find our seats, and it was just all bigger and more amazing than I could have imagined. Thousands of people singing, drinking, and waiting outside this colossal stadium that had a capacity of more than fifty thousand people. I had waited on this moment my entire life, and I was standing right in front of the stadium being able to read the big shiny blue letters saying, “Etihad Stadium”.

I remember my dad asking me, “can you believe what game we are about to go in and watch live?” I responded with a “no,” but that answer was still underestimating what was about to happen that day.

Manchester City had always been the “little brother” in the city of Manchester because of the noisy neighbors who were, and still are, one of the biggest clubs in the world, Manchester United. I had always supported Manchester City and they were never more than an average team.

When I first got introduced to soccer, it was through my dad. He has always been a huge fan of the game, and he is a die-hard Liverpool fan. I remember my first ever soccer practice when I was only five years old. My dad bought me a Liverpool shirt, but I hated the red color and I refused to wear it like only a kid would.

“It’s a girl color!” I shouted. I ended up going to training in a hoodie instead. Then day after he came back from work with a sky-blue Manchester City jersey, it was love at first sight. It was unbelievable to see my team fight for survival in the league for so many years to then have an opportunity to win the Premier League.

My dad and I had a great time. A soccer stadium is built like a rectangle. It has two long sides that allows you to see the field from the middle, and it has two shorter sides behind the goals. My dad and I had seats right in the middle on the second row which allowed us to be able to see every angle of the game. The coaching staff and the bench players were on the other side, and everything was clear. Manchester City was winning 1-0 and everything was going as any Manchester City fan could have hoped for, including me. The second half started out perfectly. Queens Park Rangers got a player sent off the field, and Manchester City was playing with a man up for the rest of the game. The former Manchester City player, Joey Barton, was sent off for unsportsmanlike conduct by kicking a Manchester city player. Joey Barton had played with Manchester City before transferring to Queens Park Rangers, which made the game even more intense. Then the nightmare started. A few minutes after the player was sent off, Joleon Lescott, a Manchester City defender had a mis-controlled defensive header which led to Djibril Cissé scoring the equalizer to 1-1. Only five minutes after that goal, Queens Park Rangers got a counterattack off a team mistake by Manchester City: looped cross into the box to find Jamie Mackie unmarked to score a header, and Manchester City were now trailing 2-1.

A shockwave went through every fan in the stadium, and now Manchester City only had 25 minutes to score two goals.

Manchester City had trouble penetrating the defense of Queens Park Rangers, and with only five minutes left, the score was the same and it all seemed hopeless.

“There really was no reason to believe this was possible – after all, no team had ever won a Premier League match when trailing going into stoppage time,” Martin Tyler said from the commentator box.

Then it started. Manchester City scored after a corner kick, and it was now a tie game, 2-2. I remember the sound and visuals of a stadium filled with crying and hopeless fans rising with a renewed energy and belief that Manchester City could make it happen. To the left of me I saw a dad hugging his crying son who must have been a couple of years younger than me, and he almost dropped his son on the concrete floor out of pure excitement. Every fan in front of me was standing up with their hands in the air pointing towards the midfield because they wanted Manchester City to get the ball out of the net and up to the middle of the field so the game could get restarted as quickly as possible, because they still needed one more goal.

In this moment I couldn’t see anything because of all the fans in front of me. I tucked my dad’s shirt and screamed, “I can’t see anything!” He lifted me up and put me on his shoulders. Everything was clear now. 

Everyone was standing up, and with only a couple of seconds left, Manchester City had the ball. Sergio Kun Aguero drove the ball up the field and passed the ball to the strong Italian striker, Mario Balotelli, who protected the ball and held back the defender. He passes it back to Aguero. He dribbled by one defender and scored a beautiful goal to make it 3-2. He ripped his shirt off and sprinted out to the fans in the stands, followed by all his teammates. No one could believe what just happened. The bench players and coaching staff ran onto the field out of pure happiness like this goal had saved all of humanity.

I have never felt anything like that moment. My dad is a die-hard Liverpool fan, but he couldn’t resist the excitement because of what just happened. He yelled to me “We did it, Rune!” almost forgetting that he didn’t support Manchester City.

 The referee blew the whistle right after the goal, and five thousand fans rushed the field from the stands. To this day the moment still feels like a dream for me. We were in the second row, so we couldn’t run onto the field. I was hugging people I didn’t know, and I had beer spilled all over me from people throwing the cups in the air of excitement. Manchester City had won their first major trophy in 44 years. It was an unforgettable moment in sports history, and I was there.