Kevin Whitcher
How refreshing to write about a football match instead of physical danger in the act of attending one after the events in Marseilles. Yesterday, I made the trip along the motorway from Marseilles to Nice. I am pleased to report I will not be returning to Marseilles, neither will I be in attendance at any further England or Russia matches. On Wednesday, Russia are playing Slovakia in Lille. On Thursday, England are playing Wales in Lens. Lens is not a very big town, so a good number of English fans will be staying in Lille, or arriving there on Eurostar. I suspect some of them will be there the day before the England game, and that some Russians will be in Lille the day after their match. You can see where I am going with this. Glad I will not be there anyway.
Nice itself is pretty clogged up on matchdays. They have closed a number of the roads to make the transport of supporters by bus to the stadium easy. That is pretty much how they want most people to arrive. There is car parking some distance from the stadium (which is pretty distant from anywhere in truth) and a shuttle bus service to those. The only problem with whichever shuttle bus you took, that was that they dropped the fans approximately a 25 minute walk from the stadium. The roads seemed to be in place for them to drop supporters a lot nearer, but they had their system. Anyone thinking of turning up at the stadium with ten minutes to spare ‘til kick off would be in for a nasty shock. So a fair old stroll in the afternoon sun. The stadium itself has a white surround, looking like a kind of squashed rectangular tyre if you can get your head around that idea, and inside looks excellent, with the stands close to the pitch and three tiers on all sides. The sun shone bright in the faces of many corporate guests on the opposite side to where I was sitting. There were a fair number of empty seats in that section, so I will just assume many remained in their hospitality areas behind glass and enjoy the air conditioning and free food and drinks rather than concentrate too hard on the game.
Northern Ireland won their qualifying group beating Romania, Hungary, Greece, Finland and the Faroe Islands. Undoubtedly more than the sum of their parts, their ethos is built upon organisation and spirit. But their lack of actual technical football quality was badly exposed here. They just could not get control of the ball for any time, and realistically, had one real chance in the whole game. Wojciech Szczesny (remember him?) in the Polish goal had very little to do. Poland were far superior and it was one of those games were the losing side were thrashed 1-0, if you get my drift. Sure, by some fluke, the Irish could have scored a goal. It happens. But it would have been one of those one in a hundred days if they had won the game. Their big match is against Ukraine, which they need to win. I can’t see them getting anything against Germany.
Their fans were great though. No trouble. Able to have a drink and enjoy themselves without needing to wind anybody up with their chanting. Sure, some local young toughs fancied trying to start something on Saturday, but from the sound of things, it was a futile gesture. The Irish were not interested in fighting. Given the sectarian background and all that goes with it in Ulster, there is a certain irony there.
Anyway, I am typing in a hotel in some suburb of Lyon not worthy of mention, having made the drive from Nice this morning. At a service station between Nice and Frejus, a pair of female hitch-hikers asked if I was heading for Lyon, which meant some company for the four hour plus drive. They were a pair of 19 year olds at university in Lyon that had been visiting a friend in Nice. Having dropped them off, I located the hotel. I have worked out how the satnav works in my hire car, which certainly makes life easier. The cost of motorway tolls here puts the price of motoring in the UK into perspective, but time is the enemy. I had forgotten quite how large a country France is, not having driven around it properly since the 1998 World Cup.
The games on TV are an issue here as well. Bein Sports have the rights to all of them, and none of the hotels I have stayed in have that. A number of games are on a pair of free to air channels, including TF1, but not that many. England v Wales for example, is only on the pay channel, and I was hoping to watch Spain v Czech Republic at the hotel this afternoon, not least to see how Tomas Rosicky performed after only playing a matter of minutes for Arsenal last season, but no luck.
I’ll leave it there for now. Back tomorrow with thoughts on Italy v Belgium, which I am attending in Lyon’s new stadium this evening.
