FC PORTO goalkeeper Helton received more than a few curious looks at the Aviva Stadium last May when he took out a scissors and started cutting away the net at the end of his side’s victory in the Europa Cup final.
It is now clear he was simply collecting on part one of a two-part purchase after the entire goalposts were bought from the stadium by the Portuguese club yesterday.
The purchased goalposts are the very ones striker Falcao scored in in the 44th minute to secure the title and they will become part of a new museum being developed by the club.
Although selling stadium property is not likely to be a major new revenue stream for the Aviva Stadium a spokesman last night did lament that Porto had not scored in both ends.
“That way we could have sold the two of them,” he joked.
The fee for the post was an “undisclosed amount” although was later verified as being in the “not very much to be honest” ball park, roughly about the cost of a regular set of goalposts.
Arrangements to transport the goalposts – measuring over seven metres in width and some 2.44m in height – to Portugal were still being made last night after an international freight company arrived to make the collection yesterday.
While cutting nets and taking goalposts is not a well-established tradition in soccer, Porto’s gesture at the Dublin stadium was followed by several Barcelona players cutting down the nets in Wembley after they defeated Manchester United in the Champions League final.
It is similar to a tradition long ingrained in the United States, where championship basketball teams “cut down the nets”, each player taking a small piece from the basketball net used in the game as a memento.