Fabrizio Miccoli was running towards 50 Birkirkara supporters rather than a 2,000-strong Benfica contingent, and the venue was a sparsely populated Republican Stadium in Yerevan rather than a throbbing Anfield, but there was less of a distinction to be made in the visceral celebrations and urge to commune with those who had travelled. Nearly nine and a half years have passed since Miccoli, now 36, last made an impact on English soil with that late Champions League scissor-kick against Liverpool and he probably would not have envisaged returning in the colours of a side that finished third in last season’s Maltese Premier League. But a remarkable individual performance on his first start for Birkirkara, scoring one and assisting another in a 3-1 win against the Armenian side Ulisses, gave the club their first-ever European away victory and set up a Europa League second qualifying round tie at West Ham that is arguably the biggest in their history.
If the severest danger in these early continental skirmishes tends to be the devil you do not know, West Ham should at least be familiar with Miccoli’s gifts. Viewed in a similar mould to Alessandro Del Piero when he joined Juventus from Ternana, he never quite convinced in Turin and the fruits of a unique style, scampering yet elegant, were largely harvested in two seasons in Portugal and a glorious six-year spell at Palermo in which he became their top Serie A goalscorer.
He departed Sicily in what appeared unseemly haste two years ago, amid reports that he had inadvertently become connected to a local Mafioso’s son; the pieces were picked up with two years at third-tier Lecce, his boyhood club, but it is still a surprise to see a player whose consistency and quality of output have barely wavered over the past decade operating in what is regarded as one of Europe’s footballing backwaters.
It is an old friend who has given him this unlikely shot at a return to prominence. Giovanni Tedesco played alongside Miccoli for three years at Palermo, remaining there for a further two in a backroom role. In advance of his appointment as Birkirkara manager in May, he advised the club’s management that an uplifting new arrival might be within their reach.
“Giovanni mentioned him by chance and I asked him to invite him to watch us in our domestic cup final in May,” the Birkirkara president, Adrian Delia, tells the Guardian. “Fabrizio took up our invitation and was in the crowd to see us beat Hibernians and take the trophy. We went to dinner together afterwards and spoke on a human level – stories about football, the stage of career he had arrived at and what our club’s expectations were. I think he understood that, although we are a tiny club in terms of size, we are a big club in terms of heart, and ultimately we convinced him to join us.
“We are a completely different kettle of fish to Juventus, Benfica or Palermo, but he has settled in very well. We had the time to speak again after the win in Armenia and he told me that, while he has played at some clubs that are huge institutions, he has never before had such a cordial, family feeling as he does now. It’s one of the advantages of being small.”
Miccoli has signed a one-year contract with Birkirkara and has certainly not done so for the money. Foreign players in Malta – and there are many, the league being dotted with Brazilians and Nigerians in particular – typically earn between €2,500 and €5,000 a month. That is potentially twice as much as a local player might expect, but somebody of Miccoli’s stature might have been tempted to seek one last lucrative package in Asia, Australia or the Middle East.
“Trying to convince him by throwing big numbers around would have been a failure in the first place,” says Delia. “We succeeded by finding middle ground between where he and we stood at this moment in time.
“He is a humble person who doesn’t act like a prima donna, and his nature is already proving to be a gelling force in the team. In Malta there have been a few cries of: ‘How?’ Or: ‘He’s only come to play in your European games.’ But he is here for the season and will be a big influence on our players as they look to learn and grow.”
Birkirkara expect Miccoli, who was fast-tracked into the Ulisses tie after a nine-day pre-season and was exhausted at the end of his hour on the pitch in Yerevan, to be even sharper at Upton Park on Thursday but they are realistic about their own hopes. The club, from a town of 22,000 inhabitants, have been one of Malta’s most successful in the past two decades and this second stage of the Europa League’s gruelling qualifying phase is now familiar territory. They have never passed further, though, and play in a league for which development is a constant struggle.
“The standard and facilities have moved forward in the last decade or so,” says Delia. “But our biggest hurdle is that income streams in Maltese football remain very much stagnant. Television rights are basically nonexistent, gate money is very modest and without financial backing it is hard to make significant progress. In the last two or three years we have tried to create alternative funding for Birkirkara, not depending solely on donations and local sponsors, and we are fortunate to be a self-sustaining club. We work cautiously and plan ahead, because without new revenue streams things are difficult in Malta.”
Between 500 and 600 fans, many of them UK-based, are expected to cheer on Birkirkara at Upton Park. It is impressive support for a team from a league whose average attendance languishes in the low hundreds – and a finely poised tie could see the second-leg crowd hit 15,000 at the Ta’ Qali National Stadium, to which it has been moved.
“This is the opportunity of a lifetime for most of our players, especially the young ones,” says Deila. “We are taking this opportunity with a mixture of humble expectation and determination, and will give our best possible against a club that is evidently a giant next to ours. It would be a dream to give West Ham a scare, but in football you never know.”
You never do, and the briefest glimpse on Thursday night of the wit, invention and finishing ability that have characterised Miccoli’s career could yet be all it takes to reposition Birkirkara and Malta in the football consciousness.
