SC fans cheer for Man United and Liverpool in Colombia | Sports

COLOMBIA — A torrential downpour may have soaked their shirts, but the weather didn’t stop soccer fans from flocking to Williams-Brice Stadium on Aug. 3 to see English Premier League heavyweights Manchester United and Liverpool face off in Colombia.

For some, it was a rare chance to see a long-time favorite play in South Carolina, or an opportunity to see the beautiful game played at a high level without having to cross the Atlantic. Liverpool won 3-0 in front of a sellout crowd of 77,559.

But as fans lined the walls and jostled for position to watch both teams enter the stadium, some had even more personal ties to one of the English teams.

Now a football coach at Greer Middle College, James Figueroa spent two years of high school battling a histoplasmosis infection. It took doctors months to diagnose him, and he described his time sick as one of the darkest periods of his life.

Watching Premier League games on Sunday mornings, however, was a bright spot – it was the one time of the week when he was sure to see his family together. On one particularly “hopeless” morning, Liverpool were playing, and Figueroa could hear the fans on the TV singing the team’s anthem: “You’ll Never Walk Alone”.

“It felt like a message meant for me at that moment,” he said, quickly becoming a Liverpool fan.

Watching the team play at Williams-Brice, where he also roots for the University of South Carolina, was “like something out of a dream,” he said.

The scene outside the stadium sometimes resembled a football party, with USC tents and cornhole boards dotting the state fairgrounds. Cocky, the Gamecocks mascot, wandered through booths selling team scarves, accompanied by Manchester United’s Fred the Red.

But the children were kicking footballs rather than throwing footballs, and the red uniforms of both English teams were a darker shade than the maroon most commonly worn by Williams-Brice.

Other shirts represented teams as local as the Charleston Battery and the Greenville Triumph, or as global as the Colombian national team and a host of European clubs.

Fans also traveled hours to Columbia for the match, such as New Yorker Merlon Davis, who said he and his entire family are Manchester United fans. Liverpool fan Ryan Peacock and his nine-year-old son Owen made the trip to Philadelphia to watch an earlier match, then drove to Columbia to watch another.

They said they had met stars such as Liverpool striker Mohamed Salah on the street before the match and were “really excited” to see the teams play again.

The opportunity for local fans to see global soccer teams like Manchester United and Liverpool play in the United States, and especially in South Carolina, can only help the sport grow here, Jim Lynch, president of the state’s official Liverpool Supporters Club, said ahead of the Aug. 3 match.

The group has grown to nearly 200 members since becoming official in 2013, sponsoring game exhibitions across the state.

But the Irishman and Charleston resident would like to see soccer continue to attract new fans and players — and have more chances to see his beloved Liverpool closer to home.

“You can’t do anything other than encourage kids to play, watch the game and just grow the sport,” he said.