Inside Liverpool plans for biggest party in a generation as huge names arrive to join celebrations

Inside Liverpool plans for biggest party in a generation as huge names arrive to join celebrations

For one glorious Bank Holiday weekend, Liverpool will represent the epicentre of the football universe as a party that has been a generation in the making sweeps across the city

Fans of Liverpool hold up a banner which reads "Champions" while standing on top of a merchandise stand and wave smoke flares after the Premier League title was sealed last month (Image: Lewis Storey/Getty Images )

The parade route is set, the trophy has its red ribbons attached and the stars have aligned. And the rest of England will be forced to admit, if only for one glorious Bank Holiday weekend, that Liverpool will represent the epicentre of the football universe between May 23 and 26.

The biggest party in a generation is finally here, and it seems that you are all invited.

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Having wrapped up a second Premier League title in five years with four games to spare last month, Arne Slot's spectacular adaptation to life on Merseyside has opened up the prospect of the sort of scenes that haven't been visible across Merseyside for quite some time

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Denied the chance to mark a first league title for three decades in a manner befitting of the achievement five years ago, supporters who are getting set to salute the 2025 vintage have plans to make up for lost time.

Even for the most cautious and conservative of Liverpool supporter, the club's sprawling, worldwide fanbase have had the best part of a month to strategise the logistics that will allow them to be part of some of the most famous few hours arguably ever in the storied history of Liverpool FC.

It's been estimated that around one million people might be set to line the city streets on Monday May 26, when the club embark on their five-hour trek from south to north before finishing up, as is customary, on the city centre's Strand, where the most memorable images are likely to be captured before they are ingrained in the annals and indelibly marked on the club's heart.

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The hotels and bars are set to do a roaring trade as fans from far flung areas of the country arrive to see the Reds lift the trophy after the Crystal Palace game on May 25, before it seeing the most prestigious piece of the silver in the country hauled across Liverpool the following day. On a weekend that also sees Radio 1's 'Big Weekend' festival arrive at Sefton Park, it promises to be quite the celebration of community and irrepressible Scouse pride.

The joyous, cathartic release begins on Friday at the Exhibition Centre on the waterfront. Billed as the Red Weekender, a three-day celebration of all things Liverpool FC will bring together BOSS Night, the Anfield Wrap and Redmen TV for a collaboration that will see the likes of Rafa Benitez, John Aldridge and even Sir Kenny Dalglish show out alongside a number of the city's famous musicians.

Almost 20 years to the day since arguably the most incredible evening of all, Benitez is back in town reliving the finer details of his defining night. The city of Istanbul has become synonymous with the most famous Champions League comeback ever and the 2005 European Cup winner will be joined in conversation with Sky Sports' Kelly Cates, kicking off the event in style alongside performances from the Lightning Seeds and Jamie Webster.

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"This one has been a good few months in the making," says Dan Nicolson, founder of BOSS Night, who has worked in tandem with the Anfield Wrap and Redmen TV to produce event.

"It's nice that we sat down together and said we could deliver something that weekend that is done to a really high level of production and we all support it, get behind it and we use that momentum to create some really nice shows for the fans."

The Red Weekender, given its timing, perhaps represents the zenith of the fan-led football festivals that have become a regular undertaking over much of the last decade.

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It's the first time Anfield Wrap and Redmen have combined in the city itself to offer fans the chance to gear up for the main events that will follow on Sunday and Monday with Slot and his players. A high tide, as the old saying goes, raises all ships.

"I think what's nice about the Red Weekender is that I think it is the first time in Liverpool that BOSS, Redmen and the Anfield Wrap have all got together and have all been in the same space," says the Wrap's John Gibbons. "We've done stuff together in the United States and Kiev, we've shared stages there but never in Liverpool. What a weekend to do it!

"We're all quite different but what unites us all is that we're all people that want to elevate people's enjoyment of supporting Liverpool and supporting of the team.

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"Obviously the team and the parade will be the main event but it does feel apt that we're doing this big event to be a part of it. Every day for us and Redmen, for years, we try to make Liverpool fans enjoy supporting this football club even more."

Ste Hoare, director of content at Redmen, tells the ECHO: "I would never have imagined we'd be able to bring Les Dennis in to host a Family Fortunes style show with the Dalglish family, which is like a nostalgic fever dream. The Red Weekender is a chance for this city to showcase the best of this city.

"We have some wonderful content creators, event planners and BOSS Night and the Anfield Wrap are both fantastic at what they do, so for us to be there as well, under the same umbrella is a real chance to show what can be done in this city.

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"And then it is a chance for Liverpool supporters from all over the world to come together and, like the old cliche, this family to come together to celebrate what has been an unbelievable season for Arne Slot and his players.

"We can't wait to get there, we can't wait to be involved and it will be a fabulous weekend and everyone who comes is going to have the time of their lives. It's going to be the perfect precursor to Virgil van Dijk lifting that Premier League trophy before the biggest and best parade of all time."

From Shevchenko Park in Kiev, to playing in front of 50,000 Liverpool fans in Madrid's Plaza Felipe II or 60,000 in Cour de Vincennes in Paris, the rise of such pageants have undoubtedly been thrust into a different stratosphere through the help of the club themselves. But the key has always been their foresight to avoid becoming too invasive or overbearing with their assistance, Dan says.

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"We can't underestimate how important [Liverpool's help] has been because I am not sure other clubs would have embraced it the same way," he says. "Even rewinding the clock 20 or 30 years, if our club would have embraced the fans so much because there is so much trust that is needed to do this.

"But there really needs to be an understanding from the club's employees that this can only really come from the supporters, to be authentic and genuine and to have the buy-in from the fans.

"The supporter culture needs to come from the ground up. So if the club ever come in and said: 'This is how you support the team, this is what we're doing' then we rebel against it. Not just Scousers, football fans in general. But our club have got a great understanding and some really key people at the club...people that really get that and understand it.

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"Those Champions League fan parks for example, of course we couldn't do that without the club at such short notice, two or three weeks to put on a fan festival in Madrid. You need the help of an organisation of Liverpool FC, but then that trust that they say that we brand it, create the programme and we work together on. I am really proud of it."

A weekend in paradise awaits.

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