It was bound to happen eventually – I’ve adpoted a British football (soccer) team.

One of my work colleagues Richard has himself a set of season tickets for him and his family. Occasionally someone can’t make it so he has a spare – a spare that he’s offered to me a couple of times. As Richard supports Arsenal, and they were the first team I saw – I decided that they’d be the team for me.

The first game I went to see was a Champions League match between Arsenal and Romanian team Steaua Bucharest. Here is the match report in case you’re interested. Emirates Stadium is Arsenal’s home ground, a recently redeveloped arena which reminded me of Telstra Dome in Melbourne – only better. We had the requisite pre-game “meal” at the ground, and I’m pleased to report that football stadium food is just as lousy in the UK as it is back in Australia. Gee that was a cr@ppy burger.

The game was a lot of fun to watch. I learned that Arsenal supporters are called Gooners – a play on the team’s nickname “Gunners”. The Gooner army was in fine form, chanting away throughout the game. In the grand scheme of things this was not considered to be an important game for the club, and the crowd was still pretty full on, so I can only imagine what they’re like for a “real” game. In a fitting result, Arsenal won 2-1. I came home with an Arsenal scarf, an Arsenal coffee mug (which even has my name on it) and a rediscovered enthusiasm for “the beautiful game”.

As a quick aside – my theory on why soccer fans chant all the time and occasionally get violent is because scoring is such a rarity – there’s not enough opportunity for release. Hence  the mad celebration when someone finally scores. Yes, it could be argued that good things are worth waiting for. But the thought of watching a 90min game for a 0-0 draw is like death for me. This ties in nicely with my extremely unpopular theory that Australian Rules Football is a far superior sport to soccer. But this is a subject worthy of it’s own post so I’ll leave it there – but I know I’m right..

I’ll be seeing Arsenal for the second time this weekend when they play Birmingham. Bring on the lousy burger and the chanting… which I’m bound to learn eventually.