The game didn't start until around 9.20 and it was a warm pleasant evening, the only negative beng the stadium was only half full. As we made our way to the stadium together with the throng of fellow attendees almost all dressed in the red and black of Atlas we passed various food stands - mainly tacos, each with its particularly pungent aroma of meat frying in its own fat wafting through the crowd- and it reminded me how sterile the same scene would be in Australia.
After a tense first 30 minutes, the beer man arrived - more accurately, we hollered for the beer man and he arrived. Where else in the world can you go to a stadium and have people bring around ice cold beer - (I started to thing of the business opportunities for the MCG) Further, and perhaps more importantly, after the beerman expertly poured each of our two beers in to a large plastic cup - he charged us five bucks each.
The lack of a screen meant that the fullest attention had to be paid to all the action, and whether it is the size of the pitch or the size of the stadium I did feel much closer to the action. After Atlas scored the crowd started to get revved up a little, but it still would have been outdone by a decent MCG throng. However in the second half things got a little more interesting, the visitors scored an equaliser and you could hear a pin drop in the stadium. After not too long Atlas scored again and the crowd regained its voice, every one was on their feet, horns played at full volume came out of who knows where and there. There was so much excitement that a message came over the loud speaker saying soething along the lines of
Being in the upper tier myself, and being aware of the Hecho en Mexico reputation I was a little concerned. In the last minutes the visitors scored again, after a free kick, which itself had resulted in a fair bit of fisty cuffs. The crowd fell silent again, the tension rose, and everyone was glued to the attempts by Atlas to try and score in the remaining few minutes. The game then descended in to hand to hand combat - as players from both sides seemed to be picking each other off behind play. (But as usual in soccer all contact is exaggerated so there was no real damage) So the game ended with the referee surrounded by players from both sides and the cops trying to pull everyone apart.
Patrons are reminded that for there own safety those in the upper tiers should not jump up and down
This didn't bother the fans as the song was blasting over the loud speaker, despite the 2-2 result Atlas had won (thanks to an earlier away victory) and would advance to the next round.
As real football is my only point of comparison, one of the key things I noticed was that the small amount of scoring in soccer diminishes the opportunity of the crowd to participate in the game - rather than smart arse comments and the relief and excitement a long bomb from outside 50 generates, there is more of a general signing and ooohinng and ahhing going on. (Or maybe my primitive Spanish meant I missed the cleverness of the songs)
Next time we will be heading to Stadium Azteca in Mexico City for a sellout. The stadium holds 110,000 fans, and no doubt plenty of beermen too.
Thanks to Emery, Javier and Raul for another true tapatio experience
No comments:
Post a Comment