As a result, I felt my trip to Greece needed no pre-adventure research, and I flew with an open mind. No, okay, of course I didn't. The way the English press goes on, I was expecting immigrants to be swamping me at the airport, prostitutes on every corner, and to find myself sharing a tent with a Syrian over the course of the weekend. What we found was something quite different.
Our first day in the city was as you'd expect it to be amongst a group of travelling English football fans. Struggle with the language, mooch around aimlessly looking at things, end up in the pub. If anybody else can offer me an alternative suggestion when deciding how to spend your first night in a country, I'm all ears. I'm now quite accustomed to this routine, and I'm quite happy to carry it on. Of course, we ended up in 'Athens Sports Bar', and it became our drinking hole of choice over the course of the weekend. Good drink, football on the box, and some cracking Prawns and Chips dinner. What a place.
First stop however was a whistle-stop tour over to the Olympic Park, home of the Olympic Stadium, which, if you hadn't already twigged, is the home of AEK Athens, our primary reason for being in the country in the first place. With the game being played on the Sunday night, we took the sensible path, and purchased our tickets the morning before the big game.
Simply go to the metro stop of the ground (I won't try and spell it on here with my Western keyboard, but it translates as 'Olympic Stadium') and as you leave the station and enter the park there's a hut to your left covered in graffiti. Thankfully, the lad that served me spoke good English, and we were able to get good seats for 20 Euros a piece. Word of warning, security at Greek football is quite high (the Panathinaikos fans were banned from attending this fixture) and as such, you will need to provide some form of identification when buying tickets, passport being the preferable option.
The rest of the day was spent exploring all that Athens had to offer, including the Acropolis, Panathaneic Stadium and the Parthenon. Thankfully, Saturday was the hottest day I'd known since our excursion to Norway back in June, and so a slow wander through the city was always going to be the order of the day. It also allowed me to take arguably the greatest photo ever, shown to your left as Andy waves back in the tunnel of the Panathaneic Stadium. There's absolutely no editing there at all, genuinely. |
Not for the first time over the weekend, Eddy had played an absolute blinder. Souvlaki is a type of sandwich kebab piece of heaven filled with beef, salad, sauce, and chips, and christ was it good. So good in fact, I even took a picture of it for you to have a look at, don't be jealous. You should really be jealous.
The day was quickly wearing on, and so we decided it best to head over towards the ground, via some rock climbing as we looked to get away from the area surrounding the Acropolis. Olmpiacos had clinched the league title earlier in the day, whilst I was posing in front of sunny landscapes in fact, but we were going to watch an altogether different prospect. We were going to see an Athens derby, in the country's Olympic Stadium, between two of the countries most famous old clubs. Let it be known, I was very excited. Very excited indeed.
Before the game, as the pyro was launched and the stadium launched itself into party mode, I noticed a young lad sat the row in front of our small collective. He was transfixed on the AEK ultras, eyes agaze as they went through their routine, not too dissimilar to myself in fact. I could see it unfolding in front of my eyes, this young lad was already an AEK fan for life. I even allowed myself a half smile as I looked back to stare into the smoky wonder that was emanating from my right.
I felt a sense of disappointment as the final whistle blew, I was in no mood to leave so soon. It sounds deep, and it sounds silly, but I almost re-discovered my childish obsession with football that fateful night in the Greek capital. I think everybody did. Moments like those I experienced during those two hours, the tension, the giddy excitement, the passion, the sense of togetherness, that's why I fell in love with football. I've a beaming grin forming on my face just thinking about it.
Cheers
Sheridan