Champions League Soccer Fans Love Them Some John Denver, West Virginia

I can appreciate and enjoy important athletic contests even when they occur in sports I don’t care about. Take soccer, for example. So this is why I was duped into watching the Chelsea-Man U pregame show this afternoon. Well, that and the fact that there were no day ball games before 3:00 today.

After the 30 minute studio show, they switched to the Scot, Irishman and Dutch/Surinamese guy in the booth who were calling the game from Moscow. As I’m listening to them speak, and trying to understand their brand of English, I heard something quite odd in the background. Observe and listen:

Yes, that would be John By God Denver blasting over a Russian stadium’s sound system. As The Guardian’s liveblog points out, “Either [communism is officially dead] or there are 50,000 Englishmen wishing that they lived in West Virginia.”

Like I said, I’m no soccer fan, so if the playing of “Country Roads” before major matches is some sort of Russian/English soccer tradition, by all means, let me know. Tradition or not, I have no idea what West Virginia has to do with Europe. Aside from good ol’ fashioned riotous, fiery football celebrations.

This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.