40 YEARS AGO: THE HEYSEL STADIUM DISASTER, FOOTBALL'S ENDURING SHAME

The fury of hooligans at the stadium for the Juventus-Liverpool match led to 39 deaths. Briaschi recalls, "It was shocking."

That night at Heysel, the Juventus-Liverpool match "had to be played, otherwise there would have been over a thousand deaths."

It was a tragedy, a massacre that indelibly marked not only Italian but also world football. Forty years have passed since that cursed May 29th in the dilapidated Brussels stadium. Even if remembering "still hurts," as 'Le Roi' Platini says, forgetting is impossible.

Liverpool Also Joins Commemorations for the 39 Deceased Fans

There have been other tragedies in world football, some even with more devastating tolls, but none are as evocative as Heysel. This is not only due to the importance of the event and the stature of the teams involved, but also to the absurdity of the dynamics, the devastating impact of the TV images, the five-year ban of English teams from European competitions proposed by London, and Thatcher's draconian measures against the hooligan plague.

One victim was just seventeen years old, with many dreams. On the night of the tragedy at Heysel, he was wearing his beloved green trousers.

It was football's shame. What should have been a celebration, like any European Cup final, turned into a tragedy, with the death of thirty-nine people (32 of whom were Italian, and over 600 were injured). Then came the endless controversy over the match being played and subsequently won by Juve with a Platini penalty. But on the accusations, the memory and opinion of those who were there on the field, like Massimo Briaschi, are almost unanimous.

"The culprits? UEFA," the former Juventus striker states, "who chose an unsuitable stadium, and the hooligans," who were banned from football and to whom all responsibility was attributed by the criminal trial. The disaster unfolded about an hour before the match when the hooligans, the most fervent and violent English fans, began pushing towards Sector Z, where many independently organized Juventus fans were located. They did so in waves, attempting to "take an end" (take over the curve) and breaking down the dividing fences. A criminal act that led to the collapse of a wall due to the immense crush, resulting in the death of many people who were trapped and trampled by the crowd seeking an escape route.

This tragedy is remembered 40 years later by those who had to play that cursed match, like Briaschi, one of the 22 players on the field that tragic evening of May 29, 1985: "I remember everything perfectly as if it were today, everything that happened. A memory that will never fade, absolutely not. A memory that stays with you forever. Why did we play? We had fragmented news about the match; people passed by saying there was one dead and that there was fighting. The truth about the 39 deaths, we only learned in the hotel after the game. It's fortunate the game was played: otherwise, there would have been more than a thousand deaths. The situation was not under control. We played in a stadium that should not have hosted a European Cup final," adds the former Juventus forward, now an agent for promising young footballers. "Even in the morning, there had been clear signs: the hooligans arrived at the stadium in shameful conditions; we had seen them in the city drinking crates of beer. The controversy over the celebration at the end of the match? UEFA told us to go under the curve to avoid worsening the situation. The blame? The organization and a stadium unsuitable for a match of that type. It was a traumatic experience," concludes Briaschi, "these are things that at twenty years old can turn your life upside down. A tragedy that must be remembered so that it never happens again."

Among the eleven on the field was also Platini: "They are bad memories," states the former Juventus number 10, who scored the winning penalty against Liverpool in that final. "I don't like talking about them. It really hurt me to think of the people who came to see us and then didn't come back." Memory, however, always returns to that cursed May 29th.