I have always been a Manchester United supporter since I was a

Host: The scene opens in the misted glow of a football stadium at night — empty seats stretching like a sea of ghosts beneath the floodlights. The rain has just ended, and the pitch glistens under the heavy lamps, each blade of grass slick with silver. Somewhere in the distance, a lone ball rolls across the turf, pushed by the wind, echoing faintly — the sound of memory finding its way home.

High up in the stands sit Jack and Jeeny, bundled in coats, the cold air blooming from their breaths like smoke. Between them, a thermos of coffee steams in the chill. On the seat beside Jack rests a scarlet-and-black scarf, frayed at the edges — the kind that’s been through more seasons than its owner can count.

The lights dim slightly as the electronic scoreboard flickers, showing nothing but time: 00:00. The game hasn’t begun, but something deeper already has.

Jeeny unfolds a newspaper clipping, its edges softened by handling, and reads aloud:

“I have always been a Manchester United supporter since I was a child, so that won’t change.” — Jaap Stam

Host: Her voice carries in the still air, simple yet steady — words that feel less like a statement and more like a vow whispered across time. The sound hangs there, echoing through the empty stadium like the faint chant of old loyalties that never die.

Jack: [smirking faintly] “Loyalty, huh? In football, that’s the rarest thing left. Managers change, owners trade, players move on. But the heart — it remembers.”

Jeeny: [watching the field] “That’s what Stam meant. He wasn’t talking about the club as a contract — he was talking about the club as a childhood memory. You can leave a team, but you can’t unlearn what it meant to you.”

Jack: [grinning] “You sound like a romantic with a scarf collection.”

Jeeny: [smiles softly] “Maybe I am. But think about it. Being a supporter isn’t rational. It’s faith — pure and stupid and beautiful. You tie your happiness to eleven strangers and believe their triumph is somehow your own.”

Jack: [looking at the empty pitch] “Faith without proof. That’s football in one line.”

Jeeny: [turning toward him] “And maybe that’s what keeps it sacred. The idea that devotion doesn’t need reason. That you can still care about something that’s broken your heart a hundred times.”

Host: A gust of wind rolls through the stands, carrying the faint rustle of old cheers. The stadium feels alive again, the air electric with ghosts of seasons past.

Jack: [leaning forward, voice thoughtful] “You know, I remember the first match I ever saw — my father screaming at the television, beer in hand, cursing and praying in the same breath. I didn’t understand the game, but I understood him. That… intensity. That belief. It was like watching faith in motion.”

Jeeny: [nodding] “That’s what sport does — it gives people permission to feel without irony. To cry in public. To hope like children again.”

Jack: [quietly] “And to stay loyal even when it hurts.”

Jeeny: [smiling] “Exactly. Stam knew that. He played for other clubs — Lazio, Milan, Ajax — but United was his home. The place where belief first took root. Once that happens, nothing can uproot it.”

Host: The lights flicker brighter, momentarily washing the stadium in white brilliance. The rainwater shimmers on the field like a mirror, reflecting the world above — two silhouettes watching, remembering, belonging.

Jack: [after a pause] “You think loyalty like that still exists? Or have we outgrown it?”

Jeeny: [shakes her head] “No. We’ve just made it quieter. People still carry it — not just for teams, but for ideals, for families, for dreams. Stam’s loyalty wasn’t about football. It was about the part of himself that refused to become cynical.”

Jack: [half-smiles] “So, loyalty is rebellion now.”

Jeeny: “Yes. In a world that trades everything — even faith — for convenience, staying loyal to anything is radical.”

Host: The camera pans slowly across the stands, over rows of empty seats that seem to hold echoes — fathers and sons, strangers embracing, the roar of victory and the ache of defeat. Each memory feels alive, stitched invisibly into the fabric of the place.

Jack: [picking up the scarf beside him, running his fingers over the frayed edge] “Funny how something so simple — just colors, a crest — can feel like identity. Like home.”

Jeeny: [watching him] “Because it is home. You don’t choose what becomes sacred. It chooses you. That’s what Stam meant — his loyalty wasn’t about geography or glory. It was about belonging.”

Jack: [quietly] “Belonging without condition.”

Jeeny: “Yes. The kind that says, ‘This is who I was before I knew who I’d become.’”

Host: The stadium lights begin to dim, leaving only the field illuminated — vast, green, and waiting. The scoreboard flashes once more: 00:00, as though time itself had circled back to the beginning.

Jack: [softly] “You know, sometimes I think loyalty is the only proof that memory still has a heartbeat.”

Jeeny: [smiles] “Then maybe that’s why we hold on to it. Because when we stay loyal — to a team, a person, a promise — we’re keeping something alive inside us too.”

Host: The camera pulls back — Jack and Jeeny sitting side by side, two small figures in an ocean of empty seats. The scarf, red and black, rests between them like a bridge.

Host: Jaap Stam’s words echo in the quiet — simple, steadfast, and utterly human:

“I have always been a Manchester United supporter since I was a child, so that won’t change.”

Host: And beneath those words lies something larger — a truth about love, about constancy, about the human need to anchor ourselves to something that endures:

That loyalty isn’t blindness — it’s memory with a spine.
That devotion isn’t weakness — it’s courage disguised as habit.
And that to say “that won’t change”
is to whisper to time itself — “you can’t have this part of me.”

Host: The final shot holds: the empty pitch gleaming like glass, the faint sound of a crowd rising from nowhere — a memory of applause, of belief.

And as the light fades, the scarf flutters in the wind —
red against the gray,
defiant, unwavering,
unchanged.