European Soccer Tour – Day 2: Aston Villa at Fulham

Today was the start of the English Premier league soccer season. For those of you unfamiliar with international soccer, in England the Premier league is basically as big a deal as the NFL is to America. It’s England’s biggest sport, and the Premier league is considered one of the finest soccer leagues in the world.

Through Austin and Gary, our fabulous Scottish tour guides, the Texan players and parents scored really good seats to a Premier league opener today: Aston Villa at Fulham.

My day began at eight. It was so good getting to sleep last night – I slept like a rock for nine or ten hours. Once I rolled out of bed, I had a delicious traditional English breakfast of fried eggs, English bacon and sausage, baked beans, a slice of tomato (pronounced “toMAHto”), toast and English hot tea. We parents had the morning to ourselves, basically, as the boys trained over at Bradfield, and the down-time was much needed and appreciated. We finally bussed over to Bradfield around eleven, and since there was some time to kill once we got there I took a walk and found this little amphitheater.



Bradfield Amphitheater

Around noon we made our way to the dining hall to eat with the boys. Note the stained glass, right above the drink stand. On a related note, I haven’t seen an ice-cube yet in my entire time in Europe.



Stained glass in the dining hall. Unfortunately, I have no pictures of ice cubes.

Following lunch we trooped onto the bus and were off for London!

Fulham and Aston Villa are both middle-of-the-pack Premier teams, but we were expecting a fun afternoon in any event. The Premier league rules are such that each team has to basically earn the right to stay in the league every year. I may post some more information on that later, but let me just say, Detroit Lions, that you should count your blessings.

I like talking Premier soccer with Gary, partly because he’s very knowledgeable, and partly because it gives me a chance to hear some excellent Scottish. I asked him who was favored and if it would be a good match. He expected it would be, but warned me not to be surprised if they played to a draw.

Below are some pictures I shot on the way into London and on our walk to Fulham’s home stadium, Craven Cottage.



Into London



The team walking to Craven Cottage. Love the game faces



A view of the stadium from our vantage point



The boys, checking their tickets to see how good the seats are
and strategizing about the best way to get into the stadium

We ended up with really good seats, about four rows up behind the visitor’s goal. We were surrounded primarily by Aston fans.



Our view of the field, prior to the game

I tried to take some action shots. I keep forgetting to learn the settings on the camera I brought (it’s Jill’s camera) so though I took a lot of shots during the game, most of them are blurry. I’ll try to get this figured out before tomorrow’s match.



Aston’s keeper, collecting the ball

The game ended up in a nil-nil (or 0-0) tie, which, I realize, seems incomprehensible to Americans. When this happens the teams both get one point for the Premier league standings, versus three points for a win and zero points for a loss. It was not a bad match, and it proved out Gary’s earlier prediction. There were some exciting plays before both goals, but, as he put it, very few positive chances.

Due to the recent troubles in London, there was a larger than normal security presence at the game. We noticed that on any controversial call, all the yellow-jacketed security people would ominously rise and stone-face the crowd, just to keep things from getting too pitchy. At the end of the game, they all stood and ringed the stadium as the players departed.



Not taking any chances at game’s end

After the game we checked out the Fulham team store for souvenirs. While we were doing that, a Rolls Royce pulled up. Its license plate was “AV1”. It turns out this Rolls belongs to Aston Villas chairman.



Blake in front of the Rolls

We walked back to the bus, found our seats and made the one-hour trip back to Bradfield for dinner. Following that, we parents were taken back to the hotel, where I now sit. Sleep, soon . . .

This has been a great trip so far. Tomorrow, Chelsea at Stoke!

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