Admission 41 euros.
Match Magazine free
How To Get There The stadium is easy to find. Visible on the main line from Aachen, upon arrival take the U-Bahn south 2 stops from Koln HBF, change at Neumarkt and take line 1 westbound in direction of Wieden West. Stop is conveniently called 'Stadion'. Alternatively it is a 45 minute walk westbound from the Aldstadt along Aachener Strasse. You may need to remember this as the trams are absolutely rammed, we ended up walking all the way back to our hotel.
Food Curry wurst at 2.70 euros. Sausage in curry sauce, das ist wunderbar.
Drink Graffel 3.50 euros. The downside is that within the Rhein-Energie-Stadion you can't use cash to buy food or drink, you need to buy a card and on top of that it costs 1 euro per glass, which is refundable upon return.
Cologne - Pubs The Aldstadt is an old part of town where several drinking establishments can be found sitting next to each other in tight narrow alleyways. Nice safe drinking environment without the British chav style youths spoiling a night out. Kolsch is the lager of choice in the area.
Cologne - The City Cologne straddles the River Rhine and was first built by the Romans in 38BC , it is currently the 4th. largest city in Germany with a population count of just short of a million. Upon exiting the main station the first time visitor can't help but notice the imposing Kolner Dom (Cologne cathedral) which stands menacingly overlooking the station square. Cologne centre was heavily bombed during World War II, I took several random walks around the city, and was amazed to find old churches and castle-type structures intermingled with office blocks and houses.
FC Koln - Some Info FC Koln were formed in 1948 as a merger between SpVgg Sulz 1907 & Kolner Ballspiel Club 1901. Club colours are predominately red with white trim. FC Koln have won the German championship on 3 occasions, including in the Bundesliga's inaugural season. Their club mascot is Hennes the goat, in the back of the matchday mag there is a picture of a real-life goat on the pitch being hugged by a deranged fan. Around the city several club goats (available from the club shop) can be seen in windows, the clubs nickame is the Billy Goats.
Rhein-Energie-Stadion Info The stadium has a capacity of 50374. Rhein-Energie is a power supply company, fans call the stadium Mungersdorf, after the name of the 2 previous grounds that occupied the same site. There is no longer an athletics track, just tall stands all hemmed in close to the pitch.
Pre-Match We arrived in Cologne about half past 3 local time, with nowhere to stay and no tickets booked. Sid went to get the tickets in the tourist board, he came back saying there was just the 1 left. Undeterred we decided to chance upon just turning up, and we struck gold as all the ticket sales points opened at 18:00 on the dot. Of course this meant we had to waste 2 and a half hours drinking beer and looking through the club shop, which got so packed an hour before kick off that security guards refused to allow further entry. Inside all sorts of goodies could be found, advent calendars, chocolate, bedsheets and the like, but the weakness of the pound meant that everything seemed so expensive, 16.50 euros for a scarf seemed to be too much and replica tops started at 60 euros. (We later found this to be the norm, only St. Pauli shirts can be found at a reduced rate of 45 euros)
Atmosphere An eye-opener for a Euro football 'virgin'. It all started with the soft-rock FC Kolle hymn (live youtube footage here) (recorded version here) which had probably 45000 of the crowd singing along to and waving their scarves. It went on for about 5 verses and I half-expected the fans on the terraces to get their lighters out at one stage. Once the match started it was fascinating to see how much more 'fanatical' the Germans are about their football and their teams. Both sets of fans brought large (and I mean large) flags and banners, a Hannover fan jumped up onto the perimeter fencing to lead the chanting orchestration, there were sparklers alit and when either set of fans on the terracing jumped up and down in tandem it was a sight to behold, it seemed as if the whole stand was swaying. Another peculiarity which may be prevalent on the continent:- the tannoy announcer will read out just the first name of a player, and the home support fill in the rest. Here they didn't even bother to announce the away line up, or any fo their substitutions!
Team News Ex Birmingham City striker Mikel Forssel started the game for Hannover.
The Match To the delight of the travelling support Hannover took the lead just as we were being served our beer. I've no idea how the goal was scored, and they refused to replay the goal on the big screen, no such censorship on show later! The lead lasted until shortly before half-time when a classy back flick from Geramel put he home side level. The young chap next too me didn't stop shouting the whole game, when he wasn't cheering his own players on, he would give the nearest Hannover player within earshot some not so good natured abuse. Even with my limited grasp of the language I could tell he wasn't being overly complimentary. The second half was mostly Cologne, Hannover did hit the bar however. The winning goal came when substitute Salou lined up a low shot from distance, which took a wicked deflection.
Final Score 1. FC Koln 2 Hannover '96 1
Attendance 47000
Also In Attendance Sid
0 comments:
Post a Comment