Don’t look back in anger Noel Gallagher, I heard you say. Because after all, you got to roll with it, you got to take your time. The former guitarist and songwriter (sometimes singer) for ’90s Britpop behemoth Oasis is a well-known Manchester City super-supporter, so of course he got his party on with the VIPs as the Cityzens won their fourth Premier League title in five seasons yesterday.
But the celebration turned bloody when Gallagher received an accidental headbutt from the father of Ruben Dias. The injury required a hospital trip, where he got stitches in his face.
“As the third goal goes in there is absolute bedlam … in the stadium where we sit, Ruben Dias’ family are in the box, a couple of boxes up,” Gallagher told TalkSport. (h/t ESPN FC)
“So I’m jumping around like an idiot, passing my 11-year-old son around like the Premier League trophy, everyone is lifting him up. And I turn around and Ruben Dias’ dad runs straight into me, headbutts me. I’m on the floor covered in blood.
“I don’t see the last two minutes. I’ve got to get taken down by the St. John Ambulance and had to get stitched up. I’ve got stitches in my top lip, I’ve got two black eyes.”
Championship Sunday certainly brought a lot of Premier League title chase plot twists and turns, which was fitting, given how the season itself played out in such a manner.
Emotions ran high and when the title was clinched, Gallagher, as he tells it, was not fully present for the moment. As for Dias’ father, he was unharmed.
“He’s a big bear of a man, he almost knocked my teeth out,” Gallagher continued to tell the tale.
“As I’m going down the corridor, Pep’s running up crying and we kind of hug each other and he says, ‘What’s up with your face?’
“I look like I’ve had my head smashed in. It’s unbelievable. A lot of City fans are asking, ‘You all right? What’s happened?’ And I said, ‘You’ll never guess.'”
This marked City’s eighth first division title all-time and sixth in the past decade.
Paul M. Banks is the owner/manager of The Bank (TheSportsBank.Net) and author of “Transatlantic Passage: How the English Premier League Redefined Soccer in America,” as well as “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry.”
He has regularly appeared in WGN, Sports Illustrated and the Chicago Tribune, and he co-hosts the After Extra Time podcast, part of Edge of the Crowd Network. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.