So as not to jinx the $275 million man and his pinstriped teammates, I have opted against prematurely singing my praises for the Bronx Bombers in this week's article. A reevaluation of Rex Ryan and his impact on the Jets will also not be assessed at this time.
No, at this juncture I feel a hiatus from the American sports scene is both prudent and necessary, especially with what came to transpire earlier this week in Europe's prestigious UEFA Champions League when defending champion Barcelona lost shockingly 2-1 at home to visitors Rubin Kazan.
Who? you may ask. And that's exactly the point. The Russian football club, whose name sounds more like a foreign diplomat (ROO-bin k-ZN) than a sports team, completed one of the biggest upsets in the history of European football Tuesday night when they stormed Barcelona's Camp Nou—the largest stadium in Europe and eleventh-largest in the world—and stunned the Catalan faithful with an unforgettable victory.
The loss was Barcelona's first at home since they fell 1-0 to Osasuna in La Liga play back on May 23 of last year, and their first at home in the Champions League since December 9, 2008 when Ukrainian giants Shakhtar Donetsk escaped with a 3-2 win in the final match of group stage play over a subdued Barça side that had already qualified for the knockout round of sixteen.
Tuesday night's lineup in the northeast corner of Spain, however, was very different. Barça fielded nearly all of their superstars (with the exception of Carles Puyol and Thierry Henry who both remained on the bench) in Xavi, Andrés Iniesta, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, and FIFA Player of the Year frontrunner Lionel Messi, each of them poised for the expected domination of the visiting Russian minnows.
Now for a quick history lesson: the city of Kazan, from where these minnows descend, is one of the largest cities in Russia and capital of the Republic of Tatarstan, lying some 450 miles due east of Moscow.
FC Rubin Kazan, the lone Russian Premier League club from Kazan, won their first league title last year and are the current leaders again this year.
They lead Spartak Moscow by one point atop the table with 50 points through 25 games, with eight of their fifteen wins coming from the friendly confines of the 30,133-seat Central Stadium in Kazan.
Rubin Kazan, or "Ruby" as its nickname states, are forever endowed to their manager Gurban Berdiyev of Turkmenistan of all places, who took the reigns of what was in 2001 a second-tier club, gained promotion to the Premier League by 2002, and in six short years captured an improbable league title, Ruby becoming just the third non-Moscow team to win the RPL.
In crafting his side into Russian champions, Berdiyev also clinched an automatic berth in the Champions League group stage, another first for Ruby, who also became the most eastern team to play in the competition's history this year.
They were then drawn and paired for home and away matches with defending champions Barça, Italian powerhouse Inter Milan, and a tricky Dynamo Kiev side—three squads that were pegged to overwhelm and overpower a young and inexperienced Russian squad making their debut in Europe's top competition.
Ruby's first match came away to Dynamo Kiev who was led by iconic Ukrainian striker Andriy Shevchenko, and while Alejandro Dom¡nguez's impressive free kick gave Rubin Kazan the early advantage, the Argentine's strike would be insufficient.
Dynamo Kiev roared back, scoring three goals in the final nineteen minutes of the match to notch a 3-1 victory.
And as conventional wisdom would have all of us believe, if Rubin Kazan couldn't beat Dynamo Kiev, they didn't have a prayer against Inter, let alone the defending champs.
Yet the next match saw manager José Mourinho, the self-proclaimed "Special One", and Inter visit Kazan, and disappointingly draw 1-1 with Ruby who outplayed the Nerazzurri and also got another goal from Dom¡nguez.
And while the press was critical in their write-ups of Inter's uncharacteristically impotent performance, they were ultimately accepting of the result under the conditions of the club having to travel an unusually far distance away, Ruby commended, but deemed more lucky than anything else; their real test would come at Barcelona where pundits were predicting a ruthless beating.
In just the second minute of play at the Camp Nou, after a towering goal kick by keeper Sergey Ryzhikov, 23-year-old midfielder Aleksandr Ryazantsev struck the loose ball with incredible venom from well outside the box and scored a missile of a goal, the vicious bender making it 1-0 Ruby over Barcelona.
The lead lasted for 46 minutes until Ibrahimovic equalized just after halftime with a scintillating finish of his own, assuring a nervy, paltry home crowd of just 55,930 in the 98,772 available seats of Barça finally grabbing the game by the scruff of its neck.
But the resilient virgins of Europe rallied and battled back and in the 73rd minute Dom¡nguez, following an extraordinary run, hit a perfect through ball to teammate G”kdeniz Karadeniz on the right. Karadeniz beat Barça keeper V¡ctor Valdés in the box with a dexterous finish that silenced the Catalans and elated Ruby in their evergreen kits.
Barcelona had two definite chances at the end, with Ibrahimovic blasting one off the woodwork, and a Yaya Touré header that met a similar fate.
But it was to be the Rubin Kazan's night, its first Champions League victory coming against the most formidable of foes to cap off what is now Ruby's most memorable games.
They comprise a squad of 26 players, fourteen of whom are homegrown Russians. Yet, the remaining bunch boasts a surprising diversity with Argentinians Dom¡nguez and right back Cristian Ansaldi, Spaniard defender César Navas, Turks Karadeniz and forward Hasan Kabze, Croatian defender Stjepan Tomas, South African midfielder MacBeth Sibaya, Ecuadorian midfielder Christian Noboa, Polish midfielder Rafal Murawski, and three Georgians, all of whom were on hand to witness an astonishing morsel of football history Tuesday night, and all of whom will be eager prove themselves again when they play host to Barcelona on November 4.
Ruby now have the same amount of points as Barcelona and Dynamo Kiev (4), and are one ahead of Inter, who have drawn their first three matches.
After Karadeniz scored the game-winning goal Tuesday night, a jubilant Berdiyev momentarily pumped his fist in euphoric bliss, then quickly wiped his brow, maintained composure, and finished managing the game.
Immediately following the goal, Sky Sports commentator Rob Palmer exclaimed, "Karadeniz has shaken Europe!" But what he meant to say was that Rubin Kazan, and all that they embody, have shaken Europe.
The front of Ruby's jerseys depicts an enormous white griffin—half-lion, half-eagle—with golden trim, fitting that the animal should be a hybrid of the king of beasts and the king of birds for a club that has just dethroned the king's of Europe in one of the most miraculous victories in football history (think the exact opposite of Mark Sanchez's performance Sunday against Buffalo).
Rubin Kazan, its inspiring play and sheer resiliency has defied all odds, but now the lingering question remains: can they finish it out and become the first Russian team to advance past the group stage since Lokomotiv Moscow did back in 2004?
If you listen carefully, you can hear the people of Tatarstan singing their republic's, and now, in all likelihood, their team's resounding motto: Bez Buldirabiz! We can!