Why the Danes just aren’t the ticket!
OF course we’d heard the reports. They come before every game. We’d heard them in Cardiff and Vienna in this campaign alone, and countless others down the years.
‘Away fans will not be admitted to the home end,’ said the Danish FA ahead of last Saturday’s clash in Copenhagen.
This doesn’t apply to us, we thought. This never applies to us. We’re not hooligans. While there’s always an element of messers, the Irish fans tend to leave only pride and laughter in their wake.
I had a ticket for the home end, though. I wasn’t worried. I’d been in this situation many times before – Switzerland in 2003, Italy in 2009, Scotland in 2014.
It’s never ideal but I see it as a situation worth putting up with to get to support my Boys in Green.
There are certain rules: don’t colours, don’t arrive at the stadium drunk and just keep the head down and pass the stewards with as little eye contact as possible. Then enjoy.
On every occasion, I’ve never felt the need to hide my support once inside the stadium, as there’s never any need to – animosity towards Irish fans is as close to non-existent as you can get.
As we got to the stadium about 50 minutes before kick-off, we noticed the ridiculously long queues at every gate.
Our own queue seemed particuwear larly long, weaving around the corner of the stadium.
The horror stories started filtering back, accompanied by the news that the stewards were looking for Danish ID for every ticket. Impossible, we thought. They couldn’t possibly be doing that. Sure there’s far too many of us.
Then a few Irish fans start walking down past us, away from the stadium.
I still wasn’t panicking. I wasn’t born with the gift of the gab for nothing. I based myself at the centre of a bunch of very tall Danish fans. My 5ft 4in frame easily passed through alongside them.
Then we reached the second line, at the scanners. They were speaking to everyone in Danish. It seemed not even I could talk my way out of this one.
A group of Northern Irish lads in front of me decided to go looking for a bar. We stopped at a steward who told us there was one just around the corner, actually a part of the stadium.
We headed around to the bar and settled in to watch the rest of the game.
We enjoyed the match as best we could. I think we could all agree it wasn’t a classic.
But when the final whistle went, 300 Irish fans walked out the door straight into the middle of thousands of Danish supporters leaving the stadium.
If there were any security concerns whatsoever, how was this allowed to happen? Why was mingling together now not a problem? Why weren’t we being segregated at this point?
Tonight the best thing the Boys in Green can achieve for me and the thousands of others left standing outside in the rain last Saturday is to ensure that it’s us who get to Russia.
Once there, we’ll prove again what great supporters we have – though hopefully this time, my ticket will be for the right end...