Groundhopping

[CosbehFox]

Wrexham going to be ticked off on August 10th - Wycombe fan here! 

[CosbehFox]

Surpassed 300 last weekend - Bromley to go for the 92. 

 

It looks like I am firmly set on:-

 

Lech v Legia - weekend of 9th Nov 

Juve v Bologna - weekend of 7th Dec 

 

Lech (and Poland) is silly how cheap it is. £140 for a double room, 3 nights in Poznan in a modern hotel. Ticket expected to be around £25. That enables me to do Turin which will be a lot more. 

 

Struggling to find someone to do Belgrade derby with in mid-Feb. I have been wondering about doing it through Away Fans - it's £300 plus flights (going to be £150-200); initially I thought this might be a bit naff but I spoke to a couple of people who did their trip out through them and they said it was really good. 

[grobyfox1990]

Chesterfield on Saturday, £20 cheapest ticket...

In Buenos Aires in November. Argentina are playing at home (should be at River Plate's ground but TBC) and there's a Boca Juniors home game whilst I am there. Looking forward to that. Will investigate some other BA clubs, but think I'll be pushing my luck to go to more than two games.

[Electric Yetis]

Currently on 57 of the current 92. Was looking at the possible fixtures this weekend for one's I haven't done.

 

Wrexham's the nearest but completely sold out. After that these are my options. No enthusiasm as I've done Colchester's previous ground. Bradford possible but was hoping for something nearer 

 

 

 

 

Edited 5 September 2024 by Rain King

[Voll Blau]

1 hour ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Chesterfield on Saturday, £20 cheapest ticket...

In Buenos Aires in November. Argentina are playing at home (should be at River Plate's ground but TBC) and there's a Boca Juniors home game whilst I am there. Looking forward to that. Will investigate some other BA clubs, but think I'll be pushing my luck to go to more than two games.

Make sure you check out the pubs and micropubs to the north of Chesterfield's ground. Was a good little scene when I went a few years ago.

[Stuntman_Mike]

We've booked Bromley in for the end of October now our Forest game has moved to the Friday night.

 

Looking forward to another day out in London 

[grobyfox1990]

Chesterfield is a decent day out, nice pubs, good ground, bit of character in the town.

The game itself was very good too, both teams good on the ball and played at a good pace. Both were much better than most teams I watched in the champo last year 

[sishades]

I have completed the 92 and am now going for the 42 (11 done) in Scotland. In total I have been to 150 grounds (Bromley was the 150th). In May I went to Gladbach and will visit the Cruyf arena in November and hopefully Luxembourg

Edited 14 September 2024 by sishades

[CosbehFox]

The penalty of doing so many grounds this Saturday - nearest new ground for the Cup is Ashton Curzon. Mossley is another option for a good trip, very pretty ground but I really can't be doing with 2hrs 30 in the motor. 

[grobyfox1990]

On 05/09/2024 at 12:12, grobyfox1990 said:

Chesterfield on Saturday, £20 cheapest ticket...

In Buenos Aires in November. Argentina are playing at home (should be at River Plate's ground but TBC) and there's a Boca Juniors home game whilst I am there. Looking forward to that. Will investigate some other BA clubs, but think I'll be pushing my luck to go to more than two games.

It's right what they say, well hard to get tickets to Boca and Argentina matches. Had to go through a connection of a connection of a connection...you get the drift.. to secure a pair of tickets to both and fairly overpriced at that. But still relative good value given £ value, and can't go there and not see the famous chocolate box stadium or Messi play in his home country. Better not move the KO times now.

Back down to earth, going to Harborough town on Saturday for their big FA cup game.

[Chris_OGrady]

 

I'm planning to check out Atalanta's new stadium sometime between January and March, and hopefully catch a good game at the San Siro too. Ideally, I'd see Inter, but I’d be happy with either team. I've been wanting to visit Bergamo for a while since it’s supposed to be a great city, and Atalanta’s new stadium and the whole set up of the club looks great. There are a few possible dates, but can’t commit until the fixtures are confirmed. I’ve made an account on the Atalanta website, but it looks like they are selling out every week atm, so need to assess how easy it is to get tickets. Annoyingly, it looks like East Midlands have stopped flights to Bergamo, but there are some decent options from Birmingham.

 

My previous trip to Italy was last October. One of my mates lives in South Tyrol and had been onto me to come to an FC Südtirol game since they got promoted to Serie B. Three of us flew into Verona on the Friday night (which is a top city) and then headed up to Bolzano on Saturday morning for their game against Sampdoria, who were struggling in Serie B at the time. The train ride was about two hours but absolutely stunning through the Alps. Bolzano is a beautiful city, with more of a German feel than Italian, and you can tell it's wealthy. South Tyrol was historically part of Austria and then was incorporated into Italy after WWI. Mussolini tried to push Italians into the area with limited success, and today it’s about 70% German-speaking and 30% Italian. You can see that split in FC Südtirol's fanbase- there’s a small group of Italian and German ultras, who are in different stands, and I think they’ve even clashed before.

 

FC Südtirol are a bit tinpot, and their ground only holds about 5,000, but the setting is incredible. Sampdoria had a good away following, and they were as loud as you’d expect. Pirlo was managing them at the time, with Fabio Borini up front. We had a nightmare getting into the stadium, so we missed the first 10 minutes or so. The Samp fans were in our stand, and you could mix with them easily in the concourse without any issues. I wrote “Genoa Merda” on my phone and showed it to one of their fans, which got a great reaction . The game was actually pretty good. FC Südtirol reminded me of watching Leicester back in the early 2000s - very negative and direct - but somehow they came back from 1-0 down to win 3-1 with late goals, which was brilliant to see. After a few beers in Bolzano (another top city), we headed back to Verona before going to Milan on Sunday for Inter vs Roma.

 

 

The train from Verona to Milan took about an hour and a half, and for anyone who hasn’t been to Italy, the trains are amazing and reasonably priced. I usually stay in Brera when I’m in Milan because it’s well located. It’s not the cheapest area, but it’s on the green metro line, which makes it easy to get to Navigli, Centrale Station, and the San Siro. You’re also only a 15-20 minute walk from the Duomo, and Brera itself has plenty of good spots. As usual, we headed to Navigli for pizza at Fabbrica Pizzeria and a few beers at Blues Canal before making our way to the San Siro for the big game. One thing to note about Milan is that most places shut down for a few hours after lunch, so you have to actively find places that stay open.

 

I don’t know if anyone remembers, but this was the game where Lukaku returned to the San Siro with Roma. The Inter ultras handed out 40,000 whistles to blow whenever he touched the ball, and my ears were still ringing the next day. When the players lined up and Lukaku was shown on the big screen, it was the most hostile I’ve ever seen a stadium. The noise and hatred were unreal. With Inter playing to go top of Serie A, plus the whole Lukaku drama, the atmosphere was electric. As I usually do at the San Siro, I bought the cheapest tickets in the upper section, and then went down to stand in front of the perspex screen at the bottom of the tier, overlooking the Inter Ultras. You can also move between the stands of the top tier through the concourses in the corners. What I always find amusing is how many English people you meet queuing up for a beer on 40 mins, such is our tradition. I’ve been to two Milan derbies, and the atmosphere was similar—the ultras sing non-stop no matter what, so there’s not much difference between a big game and the derby (except for the TIFOs). Roma brought a good following too, and it was pretty hostile outside as they were shepherding their fans into the ground.

 

 

The game itself wasn’t a classic, but Inter got a late winner causing a real lift off in the ground (not that it was quiet before). We ended up singing the most basic of Inter chants down the winding concrete stairwells with some Dutch lads, then grabbed some food from the vendors outside, who do incredible Italian sandwiches. We ended up pulling an all-nighter in Milan and nearly missed our flight the next morning, but it was well worth it!

 

The San Siro is just the Mecca of football grounds. My advice to anybody is to go! 

Edited 10 October 2024 by Chris_OGrady

[CosbehFox]

On 19/08/2024 at 10:30, CosbehFox said:

Surpassed 300 last weekend - Bromley to go for the 92. 

 

It looks like I am firmly set on:-

 

Lech v Legia - weekend of 9th Nov 

Juve v Bologna - weekend of 7th Dec 

 

Lech (and Poland) is silly how cheap it is. £140 for a double room, 3 nights in Poznan in a modern hotel. Ticket expected to be around £25. That enables me to do Turin which will be a lot more. 

 

Struggling to find someone to do Belgrade derby with in mid-Feb. I have been wondering about doing it through Away Fans - it's £300 plus flights (going to be £150-200); initially I thought this might be a bit naff but I spoke to a couple of people who did their trip out through them and they said it was really good. 

Tickets for the game before Legia are £14 & £4 for my dad  If we wanted to go VIP with unlimited beer and food, £52!

[CosbehFox]

On 09/10/2024 at 21:13, CosbehFox said:

Tickets for the game before Legia are £14 & £4 for my dad  If we wanted to go VIP with unlimited beer and food, £52!

£30 & £25 - VIP is £71 

 

That's for Man U v Liverpool basically. 

 

Trying to find another game nearby is proving a pain - Poznan is the lead city for its entire region with not even another city for some miles. I wanted to do the derby between Torun & Bydgoszcz (been the latter for Speedway) but a 8pm finish means no train back. Next option is Slask Wroclaw at home but it's a last train home job and arrive in Poznan at 1am with a 68 yr old in tow. The basketball are away, so there's a second tier handball match and the volleyball is away. 

 

So I have literally gone deep into the Polish lower divisions but nothing is really confirmed until a couple of weeks before. The difference between what to expect is massive ; you could have a former Soviet bloc huge municipal stadium with cages or a village field set up with the away end in some palisade fence enclosure. Same applies for the ultras you might end up with a real show or a complete no-show. If we have to go as low as fifth tier, we hope to pair up a couple of games - the most appealing is watching a team ran by Lech's ultras - you can only play for them if you are part of a fan group. They are fourth tier now and started the season well - Liga III is borderline professional 

[Daggers]

1 hour ago, CosbehFox said:

... Same applies for the ultras you might end up with a real show or a complete no-show...

Surprising what can turn up though

 

 

[SemperEadem]

Looking at Gladbach away with Bochum in the new year.

[boots60]

Off to Bilbao early November, hoping to see Athletic v Betis,

 

5 of us going but at present the available tickets are mainly lone seats scattered across the stadium. The athletic website states that the 'Taquilla's' are open the day before & on matchday & I have bought tickets this way previously at Barca, Real & Valencia, albeit quite a few years ago.

Has anyone any experience or tips on ticketing at San Mames recently as things have possibly changed this past few years. I am hoping that there will be returns/extras on sale of the weekend of the game.

[CosbehFox]

13 hours ago, boots60 said:

Off to Bilbao early November, hoping to see Athletic v Betis,

 

5 of us going but at present the available tickets are mainly lone seats scattered across the stadium. The athletic website states that the 'Taquilla's' are open the day before & on matchday & I have bought tickets this way previously at Barca, Real & Valencia, albeit quite a few years ago.

Has anyone any experience or tips on ticketing at San Mames recently as things have possibly changed this past few years. I am hoping that there will be returns/extras on sale of the weekend of the game.

Basically you assume right. 

 

Couple of weeks before hand - you'll start to see a load of tickets become free because the season ticket holders and member clubs have given their places up. Bilbao specifically have a chat with Pentland Club online - they have access to tickets, it's the English supporters club. The chap behind it was ready to get us 15 tickets for a stag do but the fixture got moved annoyingly. I went the day before out on my Tod instead. Best modern stadium I've been. Incredible atmosphere around the ground. 

 

Really want to go back to the city (and the region) - it's brilliant. The fourth tier game I went to was superb fun as well. 

Edited 17 October 2024 by CosbehFox

[CosbehFox]

Snoozed on the Lech v Legia 2pm opening sale - looks like we are coughing up the smoke and being part of the tifo in the top tier! 

[goody2028]

Hoping to tick off the Olimpiakó Stádio next month. 

[Sir Steve Howard]

Eyeing up Noah v Vikingur Reykjavik in November

[CosbehFox]

https://destinationcalcio.com/calcio-weekender-bari/

 

Sign me up 

[Sir Steve Howard]

On 18/10/2024 at 12:36, Sir Steve Howard said:

Eyeing up Noah v Vikingur Reykjavik in November

This has now evolved into 
Wed: Alashkert v Ararat Armenia 
Thur: Noah v Vikingur 
Sat: Bologna v Venezia
Sun: Parma v Lazio

[CosbehFox]

36 minutes ago, Sir Steve Howard said:

This has now evolved into 
Wed: Alashkert v Ararat Armenia 
Thur: Noah v Vikingur 
Sat: Bologna v Venezia
Sun: Parma v Lazio

Don't know your travel plans but Friday night has Reggiana v Sassuolo - basically the real club of EMilo Reggia v the squatters 

[Sir Steve Howard]

3 minutes ago, CosbehFox said:

Don't know your travel plans but Friday night has Reggiana v Sassuolo - basically the real club of EMilo Reggia v the squatters 

Flying Yerevan--Malpensa on Friday night so will miss that unfortunately

Went to see the squatters last year v Empoli, Reggio Emilia is a right dump.

Edited 30 October 2024 by Sir Steve Howard

[CosbehFox]

Just now, Sir Steve Howard said:

Flying Yerevan--Malpensa on Friday night so will miss that unfortunately

Went to see the squatters last year, Reggio Emilia as a right dump.

Exactly the same take on my visit last year. The walk from the station to the stadium is a right horrible journey. Ground is like Reading's. Was amazed to find a craft beer bar in some office complex open when we went. You've slightly done over on the fixtures as normally Emilia-Romagna is good for a double day visit.