‘I found myself in the elevator with my idols, Gerrard, Fowler & Houllier!’ – My Liverpool Life

In the latest edition of ‘My Liverpool Life‘, Reds fan Nish Veer shares his unique life supporting the club so far, from his podcast days to those very early kickoff times in Australia.

 

I started supporting Liverpool because…

My dad moved to Liverpool in the early ’70s as he was a fan, and my two older brothers were born there, so I really didn’t have a choice.

I didn’t get the pleasure of being born in the city, though, as my parents moved away in the 1980s and I grew up as a southerner… very wool, I know.

 

My first Liverpool game was…

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - Wednesday, July 24, 2013: The official attendance of 95,446 is announced as Liverpool take on Melbourne Victory during a preseason friendly match at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. (Pic by David Rawcliffe/Propaganda)

As mad as it sounds, it was the 2013 Liverpool tour of Australia when they played in Melbourne in front of 96,000 fans.

Never thought that’d be my first game, but since my parents moved out of the UK to New Zealand in 1995, I never really had the opportunity. I know this game was a first for a lot of Aus/NZ-based Liverpool fans, so it was truly special.

 

My favourite season supporting the Reds was…

For me, 2013/14, 2018/19 and 2019/20 stand out in a big way because the football was absolutely electric, winning the Champions League and Premier League in the last two mentioned seasons respectively… but for some reason, my head always goes way back to our 2000/01 season.

Liverpool Trophy Parade, 2001 (Fowler, The Strand) (Image: PA / Alamy)

I’d just cracked 18 years old, Michael Owen was firing on all cylinders and Gerard Houllier had just guided us to FA Cup, League Cup and UEFA Cup wins. Just a beautiful time to be a Red!

 

Nowadays, I follow the club…

Still from my couch in Sydney, Australia. I last visited Liverpool with my wife back in 2018 before the world got turned upside down.

It still feels like home to me. The city, the people, Anfield… it all just feels familiar despite being away from it for so long.

No matter how bad we’re playing, I still make the effort to get up at stupid-o-clock to watch our Reds as I haven’t learned the art of watching a game that isn’t live (just no excitement there!).

 

Liverpool is a unique club because of…

Even if we got rid of all of our players, our staff, our stadium, the whole lot, we would be able to rebuild with the same identity and ethos.

LIVERPOOL, ENGLAND - Wednesday, April 28, 2022: Liverpool supporters on the Spion Kop before the UEFA Champions League Semi-Final 1st Leg game between Liverpool FC and Villarreal CF at Anfield. Liverpool won 2-0. (Pic by David Rawcliffe/Propaganda)

We’ve wholeheartedly taken on the values that permeate through the city and instilled them into our club. It’s an extremely special thing to know that the club that you love and follow your whole life also believes in the same values you do.

It’s not fabricated or used as a marketing stunt, it’s just who we are.

 

My best story involving the Reds is…

During the LFC Legends tour of Sydney in 2017, I found myself in the elevator with so many of my idols, Steven Gerrard, Jamie Carragher, Robbie Fowler, Houllier and more.

During the elevator ride down, one of the players said something along the lines of “Wow, just like the old days with all of us here, and you gaffer (Houllier), it’s so great.”

Robbie Fowler piped up and said, “Well looks like I won’t be getting a game tomorrow then!” and all the players erupted in laughter.

It was so good to see that after all these years and the heartache Robbie must have gone through with not being picked often by Gerard, they can have a proper laugh about it now.

 

I once met…

Geez, all of them! The great thing about being an Aussie Red is that the players are extremely welcoming and happy to chat in this part of the world.

They’re here to train, but they also know that they’re here to meet and greet the fans.

Thanks to my friends at LFCNSW (official supporters club), I had a lot of opportunities to meet basically all of the players in 2013, 2015, and 2017 (legends), and other touring legends like John Barnes (my idol).

 

You’ve had your own LFC podcast in the past, what inspired you to go into that space and what was the greatest memory to come from it…

I really just wanted to talk to fellow Reds across the world. I would ask some of the bigger podcasts if I could be a guest, but with my little online following of 10-20 people, I never really got a look in, so I just made one myself!

The whole point of ‘The LFC Couch’ was to connect with Reds like me all over the world who had an incredible passion for the club, but not the social following that would get them the attention of the more established podcasts.

Four-and-a-half years later and something like 600+ episodes, it was a great run but real life eventually catches up (having two babies) and it was the right time to hang up the mic and get on with raising the family.

My greatest memory was having LFCNSW invite the LFC Couch Sydney-based crew (myself, Peter Kofinas, George Xanthis and Nick Nova) to be the live-pod entertainment in the lead-up to the Champions League finals.

The first one didn’t go as planned with the result, but the second we got it done and the whole night was amazing. Just feeling the energy of hundreds of people in Cheers Bar, Sydney, entertaining them with chats, trivia, prizes etc… we really felt like a big part of the community that night.

 

If I could have dinner with three people from Liverpool’s past or present I would choose…

John Barnes, Bill Shankly and Craig Johnston — all amazing people and I’m sure great fun to have dinner with. Simple as that.


* Thanks to Nish for sharing his ‘Liverpool Life’. You can find Nish on Twitter @CouchNish.

Read more fan stories in our My Liverpool Life series here