The Little Man for the Big Occasion (ESPN article)

by Dave Usher for ESPN

Last week, I wrote about the lack of love for Michael Owen from fans of the club's he played for, in particular followers of Liverpool. This week I'm writing about a man for whom the opposite is true. Luis Garcia announced on Tuesday that he was calling time on his playing career and the internet was immediately awash with emotional Liverpool supporters paying tribute and sharing their favourite Garcia moments. This was in stark contrast to the shrugged shoulders and collective "meh" from most of the football world when Owen announced his retirement towards the end of last season.

Garcia wasn't at Liverpool as long as Owen, he didn't score as many goals or win as many trophies as the England man, he never won the Ballon d'Or whilst wearing the red shirt and he didn't score in cup final successes either; but when it comes to popularity on the Kop, Garcia beats Owen hands down.

Most Liverpool fans adore the Spaniard, yet he may never have arrived at Anfield had Owen not decided to jump ship in August 2004. Rafa Benitez put the money received for Owen from Real Madrid to very good use, bolstering his existing transfer kitty to snap up Garcia and Xabi Alonso.

Alonso turned out to be the more accomplished of the pair; he spent longer at Anfield and has since gone on to become a key man for both Real Madrid and the Spanish national side. His career path continued in an upward direction after leaving Liverpool, whereas for Garcia his spell on Merseyside was as good as it got. But boy was it good.

Nobody contributed more to Liverpool's 2005 Champions League success than the little Spaniard, not even Steven Gerrard. The skipper etched himself into club folklore with his spectacular winner against Olympiakos when it looked as though the Reds were going out at the group stage, and everyone remembers what he did to drag his side back into the final against Milan when Liverpool trailed 3-0 at half time in Istanbul.

Garcia's contribution cannot be understated though. He found the net three times over the two legs against Bayer Leverkusen at the first knockout stage, he bagged a spectacular winner against Juventus at Anfield in the quarterfinals, and -- irrespective of what Jose Mourinho says -- he scored the winning goal against Chelsea in front of the Kop in the semifinal. On what is viewed by most as Anfield's greatest ever night, it was Garcia who grabbed the all important goal that sent Liverpool to Istanbul.

Mourinho and Chelsea have never been able to accept that Garcia's shot crossed the line that night and often refer to it as "the ghost goal". What nobody ever seems to mention is that if that goal had not been given then things would have been far worse for the Londoners. The referee that night, Lubos Michel, has since said: "If my assistant referee had not signalled a goal, I would have given a penalty and sent off goalkeeper Petr Cech."

So Mourinho can complain all he likes -- and goodness knows he does -- but if you'd stopped the game at that moment and given him the choice of Garcia's goal standing, or having to face a penalty kick and play the rest of the game with ten men, he'd almost certainly have opted to be 1-0 down with 86 minutes still left to play with a full complement of players. Perhaps the next time he brings up the ghost goal someone should point that out to him.

Read the rest of the article here.