“No matter what it was, no matter what it will be, we will always be here” – this was the message of the Újpest hard core prepared for the derby.
And indeed, not counting the three Hungarian Cup victories of the last 13 years, the Duchatelet era will not go down in the chronicle books as the purple and whites’ most successful period. However, at the beginning of February, a ray of hope promising change for the fans appeared, as the Belgian businessman sold the club to a subsidiary of the MOL group. What kind of future awaits IV. after the actual change of ownership at the end of April. for the districts, it is still malleable, but it indicates the seriousness of the project that the annual budget of Újpest can be seven billion forints. In addition, the appointment of Géza Mészöly to Újbol, who replaced Nebojsa Vignjevics and celebrated his 57th birthday on Sunday, went down well with the fans. They are particularly pleased that so far no decision has been made in the coach’s disciplinary case, so after the unforgettable 6-0, he can be on the bench again in the home clash against Ferencváros.
Of course, there would have been no need to recruit domestic fans for the 240th derby even if the positive changes mentioned above did not take place, even though the Szusza Ferenc Stadium was almost completely full, since Újpest was defeated more than eight years ago, on December 12, 2015 Fradit is the champion. The green and white fans added theirs to the full house, expecting another must-win against their arch-rival, especially since they lost 1-0 to Olympiakos in the second leg on Thursday, so they had to say goodbye to the European Conference League.
As usual, the two camps greeted each other “kindly” long before the starting whistle. It was not clear from the side stand what was happening, but at one point the fradistas suddenly ran up to the top of the guest stand and threw pyrotechnic devices and beer glasses from the height towards the street – we assume that they were not practicing target throwing.
By the time tempers calmed down, the official starting teams came out. Speaking at the press conference after the EKL elimination, Dejan Sztankovics was broken, yet motivated, changed in several places: Samy Mmaeé was replaced by End Botka, Eldar Civic by Cristian Ramírez, Mohammed Abu Fani by Mohamed Ali Ben Romdan, Kenan Kodro by Stepjan Loncar instead of a striker, Marquinhos by Bálin Katona – so Fradi returned to the formation of a single striker.
Mészöly, which has a positive derby record (6 wins, 2 draws, 1 loss), also used its starting line-up, replacing Simon Krisztián with Albi Doka and Ognjen Radosevics with Luca Mack.
Compared to the fact that the two fan bases fired almost all of their rifles when the players entered the field, a huge cloud of smoke stretched across the field, it’s a wonder that the starting whistle at 5:30 p.m. was only one minute late.
We don’t know if Ramírez was suffering from too much smoke or something else, but in the second minute he almost scored one of the most comical goals in derby history. The Ecuadorian national team left-back wanted to free him in front of his own penalty area, but instead he kicked Ibrahim Cissé in the face with merciless force, and the ball that came off him bounced just past the bottom left corner.
After a little care, the match continued, with more Újpest situations. The purple and whites were visibly fired up by the reception and Géza Mészöly, they put considerable pressure on Fradi, they slid and climbed for the balls, and within the first ten minutes they had three more chances to score – the header following the two corners did not miss the goal by that much, Dénes Dibusz could only hit Branko Pauljevics’ powerful shot.
Even though Újpest had one of its best derby starts in recent years, Barnabás Varga signaled with a header in the 14th minute that he was hungry for a goal this time, and in the 37th minute, after tripping Bálint Katona and a nice trick, his team got the lead. In addition to his hit, he was not really rewarded by the IV. district camp, that the Hungarian national team striker celebrated right in front of him with outstretched arms.
And we were wrong in that there was no smoke left in the arms of the fradistas, after scoring the leading hit, they once again covered the playing field in “fog”, so the game stopped for a long time. During this time, both coaches handed out tactical instructions to their players, and Stankovics clearly came out better. Eight minutes after the first goal, almost the same scenario followed: Katona passed, Varga rolled into the net, and the Fradi camp fumed. Needless to say, Varga and Katona’s first derby went quite well. Vincenzo Sasso, who holds the position of match analyst at FTC, will have a less memorable match, as he was sent off by referee Balázs Berke for texting after the second away goal.
Géza Mészöly tried to shake up his team with a triple substitution during the break, and initially it seemed that he was not on the wrong track – in the 52nd minute, Dibusz pushed Mörschel’s dangerous shot into the corner. At the same time, three minutes after the Ferencváros triple change, in the 65th minute, there was no sign of any change. The newly arrived Marquinhos passed from the left side to Loncar, who came in the middle, who greeted him warmly, rolled it into the net, and then came the usual cloud of smoke.
Perhaps all the Greek fire was not yet extinguished, ten minutes later Fradi’s goal came: after Loncar’s kick-out, Aleksandar Pesics, also coming on as a substitute, confidently sent the ball into the net. Even after the fourth goal, the fuming fradistas did not hold back, but this time they sang the song Happy Birthday to Mészöly as an encore.
The song ended, but the Ferencváros cylinder didn’t: in the 83rd minute, Pesics also doubled up, calling the people of Újpest to complete silence and setting up the shocking final result of 5-0.
It is certain that the home fans standing in mourning silence at the end of the match should keep their promise before the match, because maybe now the team will need them the most.
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NB I
Pesics also spoke about the derby and Kodró: “I didn’t fully understand why it was necessary”
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“Újpest-Fradi on Megyeri út, this is the top for me!” – a conversation about the charm and respect of the derby with Krisztián Simon