The Olympic Experience

I have to say that Danny Boyle’s opening ceremony for the Olympics was spectacular. I was a bit worried after the Beijing Olympics that anything in comparison would look like a damp squid but he really pulled it off: mainly by playing to our strengths by being fast, funny, self-deprecating, ever so slightly bonkers with perfect chorography and an Olympic cauldron that was a work of genius. The odd thing is, by the time this started I had already been to my Olympic event on Thursday.

The Olympic Football seems to take some stick with some claiming it has no place in the Olympics and others claiming that it is a second rate tournament. I would disagree on both counts as it has been at the Olympics almost from the beginning and, with the men’s event being restricted to under 23’s, it still retains an element of the amateur origins of the Olympics that have been largely lost with the mega-bucks of the main track and field events. I actually bought my tickets for Hampden last year – seemingly in a minority – and had been hoping for one of the big names in the form of Brazil or Spain. I was duly rewarded with the World and newly crowned European champions of Spain playing Japan with the added bonus of Morocco vs Honduras to start off.

The doomsayers in the media had been predicting some sort of organisational Hell for the games. I was a little worried when it was reported that the video for the North Korean women’s team at Wednesday’s Hampden game had been accompanied by the flag from the South. Oh well, at least it wasn’t as if we offended some sort of unstable dictatorship who keep letting off nuclear weapons and who we are probably still technically at war with. As it was, the security around the ground was fine: mainly as Strathclyde Police were running the show and they have plenty of experience at organising major international football events. However, I also have to say that the non-police security staff were both efficient and courteous. As it was we got to the ground a bit too early and had to wait an hour before the first match started with a local pipe band providing the pre-match entertainment.

The one area I would quibble with was the catering. The pre-game literature pointed out that no food or drink would be allowed into the ground but that quality nutritious food would be available. It wasn’t and I think the average Stenhousemuir home game has a better selection. As it was, the choices were Scotch pies, steak pies, a bean pie (whatever that was – intended for the veggies) and chicken curry pie which appeared to be a halal option – this was a nice touch given that Morocco were playing but entirely useless as it is Ramadan and the faithful wouldn’t be able to eat anything anyway. The drinks were a choice of Coca Cola fizzies, coffee or something described as “Beefy Drink” which I am assuming is a de-branded version of Bovril. I suppose it’s quite typical of the fayre at Scottish football grounds – at least it would have been in the 1960’s.

Anyway, on to the football. Morocco kicked off against Honduras at 12:00 with the ground only half full. I rather suspected that this may be the case with Spain being the main attraction. However, those that turned up late missed a cracker of a game. I have to say that I sided with  Morocco as the Hondurans were rather au fait with the diving antics of the senior professionals that really wind me up. Also, I was rather taken with the speed and talent of some of the Moroccan forwards, particularly the shaven headed Nordin Amrabat (actually an over 23 player) who appeared to have the ball attached to his feet with Velcro such was his control down the wing. The Moroccans scored with a belter of a goal in the first half just in front of where we were sitting. In the second half things started to get a bit tetchy with the Hondurans scoring and then being awarded a pretty dodgy penalty (it looked like a straight dive from my pretty decent vantage point.) I managed to get a photo of this being converted:

Morocco were not to be outdone and managed a fantastic equaliser before things started to get nasty. Zakarya Bergdich was sent off for kicking out at a Honduran player (who I later discovered had just kicked Bergdich) but there had been a fair bit of baiting going on before hand. Morocco held on but it rather put a dampener on the rest of the game.

There was an hour’s gap before the Spain vs Japan game and we queued up for the crap food for much of this time. It also became clear that the ground was now filling up quite nicely. I had noticed quite a few Moroccan fans before the games and the Japanese were also there in good numbers and had made quite an effort with a couple of girls dressing up in Kimonos and one chap looking something akin to a Samurai warrior (sans weaponry). I took this picture of the couple who were sitting just behind us. It was more difficult to see many Spanish fans, there were probably quite a few there but they were swamped by the number of British (and, presumably, mostly Scottish) fans who had turned up in Spanish replica shirts or with Spanish flags and scarves. Let’s face it, this was the big attraction and we were all waiting to see a master class from the World Champion’s wunderkinder. Except, no-one had explained this to the Japanese…

It’s the great mystery: just how do you stop the Spanish Tika-Taka passing your team to death. The Japanese youngsters seem to have found a way – simply by sharp tackling, intercepting passes and a frantic, furious work-rate. I really have not seen so much energy expended in 90 minutes as this young Japan side were able to draw on. They certainly had the skill to take on the Spanish on a man to man basis but the pace of the counter attacking was really breath-taking. It really didn’t come as a major surprise when they took the lead through Borussia Mönchengladbach’s Yuki Otsu – other than the Spanish really looked to be in total disarray. It could have, and should have been, a 2-0 lead at half time. Inigo Dominguez tripped Nagai on the edge of the box. Nagai got up and took a quick free kick for Higashi to score – only for the referee to pull play back and send Dominguez off for fouling as the last man. It was a poor choice in my opinion and neither in Japan’s nor the game’s interests.

As the second half commenced the Japanese only seemed to become better with counter-attack after counter-attack. The only floor I could see in their game is one very obvious one: the game finished 1-0 and for all the spirit of Japan’s game, their finishing was rather poor. However, the other odd thing to witness was that the Hampden crowd, who had come to see the mighty Spanish, were now cheering and willing on the East Asians with chants of "Nippon! Nippon!” being heard around the ground. Towards the end of the game it was quite clear that the Japanese players were exhausted but they still kept attacking the Spanish goal right into stoppage time. A standing ovation was to follow and the Japanese players came over to acknowledge Hampden’s North stand at the end:

For all the naysayers the football was a hugely enjoyable event and a great day in the Olympic tradition. It’s certainly not one I will forget in a hurry.