Done three games of interest this month.
Turkey; This didn't go to plan, but there wasn't really any way around it. The problem you have in Turkey is the tickets for the games go on sale just days before the game takes place so you have to commit to a trip before you go out there. You have to take a leap of faith. Ours fell flat on its arse as the Fenerbahce - Galatasaray tickets sold out before it even fell down to our bracket. I wouldn't mind having a second crack down the line and Istanbul is a city big and interesting enough to justify going back to, but if I did it over again I would probably try and get a membership at the club of the home team. Find it interesting how pricey the tickets are as well, I think you've got to be very well off by Turkish standards to get to these games, substantially lower wages than over here and this game was priced probably even higher on average than a big Premier League game. It's pretty brutal.
We did get to Fatih Karagumruk v Besiktas the day before, played at the Ataturk Stadium, the ground where Liverpool won the Champions League in 2005 and Manchester City won it in 2023. It's a strange ground, a bit of a white elephant, and Karagumruk having to play there is ridiculous really - they're based 40 minutes away from that ground and they're obviously nowhere near big enough to play there either, but rules of the league mean they basically have to. Crowd was 1,500 in a 75k stadium. The biggest surprise to me was the small away end from Besiktas too - I had this silly idea they would take thousands but it was virtually none. Besiktas won comfortably, Ndidi played, Cengiz Under missed a penalty
The atmosphere, in fairness, for how bad it 'should' be with those numbers and size of the ground, wasn't bad. They were trying. It's a shame Turkey is such a pain in the arse logistically for getting to games because I'd imagine it's sensational for the big games. I think I will try and get out to some of the bigger clubs one time. Maybe an idea is if they're all at home one week in Europe a day apart or something.
The last couple of days I went to a couple of games - Linfield v Glentoran yesterday, Hibs v Hearts today. Flew out to Belfast at 6am on boxing day (I have a screw loose), walked around some pretty rogue areas of Belfast in the morning then went to the ground.
This was the biggest crowd in Northern Ireland in years according to google (10,500). Linfield really are Rangers-lite, loads of the same songs. Got given a free scarf pre-match. Pyro display at the start was great and did build my hopes up that the atmosphere would be good but I thought it was a bit of a damp squib in the home end in all honesty. You had a group down the front going for it but there wasn't a tonne of buy in, in truth. Glentoran's end was not dissimilar, they must've had about 3k there themselves. Was a pretty good away end.
Linfield were really, really bad. They went in as favourites and wouldn't have scored if they were still playing. A proper disappointment for them in the derby, the stats according to flash scores were 3 shots each Glentoran won 0-1. Fully deserved the win for me. I went into that game with a higher opinion of the level of that league than I think I should've done. I had a bit of a look through the squads, their careers etc... and concluded Linfield are probably the level of a team like Boreham Wood. It probably shouldn't be a surprise though, it's a tiny country. It was a decent experience albeit ****ing freezing.
Todays game was fantastic. I've had really good change out of trips to Scotland, doing Rangers v Fenerbahce in March and then that. I secretly sort of wanted Hearts to win because I want them to win the league, but not too upset they didn't. Hibs 3-0 up just after half time but nearly threw it all away in the last 15 minutes.
Similar to Linfield you had a group similar to UFS at the front of both lower tiers. Gave it everything but I was again a little disappointed by the lack of buy in from elsewhere. I really like Easter Road, it's a cracking ground with good acoustics. Scottish fans are a bit like northern English on steroids - incredible numbers punching the air when a decision doesn't go their way. Fantastic shouts from people around me throughout as well. I thought Hearts' end was actually really bad for their numbers. Reminded me of times when Leicester have taken big ends to places and barely mustered a song after the 1st minute. Didn't help that they went behind straight away but even still. It's hard to explain, it was a good atmosphere, but it was more in terms of crowd reactions rather than songs, if that makes sense.
Hibs win meant I got a sunshine on leith. Unsure how to post videos but it didn't disappoint. Bloke next to me told me to stay for it, you wait and see how good this is. Oh I know, don't you worry.
Really good game though. It's all come a bit soon for Hearts, looks pretty obvious to me after this that Celtic will win the league this year. Hearts will probably finish 3rd in all honesty, but I've no doubt they'll get better and better under Bloom, only have to look at what he's done in Belgium.
Went to Edinburgh City v Spartans for a half as well afterwards - 10 minutes walk away. Actually a pretty fun game but we had a flight to catch so had to dash.
Edinburgh struck me as really nice but I had so little time there that I couldn't really see anything. Landed last night absolutely shattered and had to leave fairly early today. I'll likely go back, maybe even for the return fixture at Tynecastle one time.
But yeah good month for trips. Germany for the umpteenth time is my next one at the end of January - looking at a triple header of Bochum v Schalke, Dortmund v Heidenheim and Fortuna Dusseldorf v Paderborn. Outside bet we manage to sneak Koln v Wolfsburg in too if we get there early enough on the Friday. Would like to do Cremonese this season but want to tie it in with something else, possibly one of Switzerland, Slovenia or Croatia, if it works.
