All the other bloggers writing about the rise of the Chinese Super League do it from afar. We wanted to check out the scene first hand. Welcome to your first primary research blog post about Football in China.
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Walking around Beijing, there are no clues that there is a Football club at all. Nobody is wearing the jerseys, there is no colourful graffiti, no Continue reading
My guide picked me up at the station and found the bus line needed. It’s one of those adorable post-communist buses with peeling paint and a conductor sat in a high-viz issuing tickets. As we approach Kiev’s Olympic Stadium, quite a sight to see, the vast amount of police becomes apparent.
“Can you ask what’s going on?”.
My guide walks up to a guy in knock-off sportswear and they talk.
“Okay so there is a Football game right now inside that Continue reading
You’ve not made it as a city until a pop song has been written for you. New York. Paris. Amsterdam. Bangkok. Erm, Amarillo. This tradition exists among songwriters in other languages also. In German, the ballads are usually dedicated to the romance, excitement and hedonism of Berlin. It lends itself far better to poetry than, for example, Bremerhaven. But one unlikely German city has found itself subject of a modern smash-hit.
Rostock. The song Continue reading
This time last year 1. FC Union Berlin hosted SV Austria Salzburg in a ‘charity match’ friendly with proceeds going to everyone’s favourite fan-owned club in the Mozart-Stadt. We were there for the game in the away end with the Salzbürger for what was a momentous occasion and a rowdy atmosphere during the customary January Bundesliga hiatus that makes every German Football loon twitchy. Some, so fed up of the lack Continue reading
A wall of aggression. A barrier of taxpayers’ money. One single channel holding 2,000 fans in complete anarchy. Glassware continued to rain down indiscriminately. A middle-aged woman behind me shook with fear. Two men burst through the crowd, one supporting the other, blood rolling down his face. It wasn’t a fight because it wasn’t fair. Our travelling support suffered greatly; it was more than humiliation Continue reading
Eastern European Football fans are very much feared in the West, something I’m certain they take great pride in. And few come scarier or harder than the Poles. We picked a game, took out some Złoty, called up fellow blogger Between Distances and hopped the border to watch Pogon Szczecin take on Ruch Chorzów to see just how scary they get.
Right now in 2016, Polish fans have an awful reputation abroad. Be it the story of player Dominik Koszowski Continue reading
Pogon Szczecin vs Ruch Chorzów. We travelled down with fellow blogger Between Distances to the Stadion Miejski im. Floriana Krygiera for the match and were not disappointed. Epic choreo, epic people, epic prices, epic day.
A more detailed post to follow.
It was a group of Hertha-mad friends that steered me toward the Blau-Weiße Alte Dame, and an Away Day was something of an eventuality. Down the pub you’re always chatting about terrace life, and these boys had criticism for the atmosphere at English stadia, or rather, lack of it. Naturally that was something I disputed quickly. But the story of my second Hertha BSC Away Day made me understand just what exactly they were talking about. This is that story. Continue reading
From Boothferry To Germany 