06.21.05
Blackburn and Back
After Norway beat Sweden in the UEFA Women’s Championship semi-finals last week we decided, on a whim, to go and catch the final held at Ewood Park up in Blackburn on Sunday! It was hardly worth driving 120 miles just for one afternoon, so we made a weekend of it and drove up on Saturday instead.
The weather on Saturday was gorgeous so, after finding a place to stay (conveniently located right across the road from the stadium), we started walking in to town. Half a mile, a couple of hours, several pints of alcohol, and much hayfever-induced sneezing later we realised we had no idea where we were, although we could just about see Blackburn cathedral in the distance, so we caught a bus. There really isn’t much to do in Blackburn centre on a Saturday evening, unless you fancy hanging outside one of the umpteen kebab shops. Fortunately we stumbled across an italian restaurant, where we had a nice pizza and a bottle of wine before waltzing our way across to a taxi-rank, where the cabbies were waiting to whisk us back to Ewood park.
On Sunday we drove back into the town centre to see what the city could offer in the way of shopping. The answer: not much. So we had a quick bite to eat and went back to the stadium to sort out tickets for the match. I was surprised to find the crowds starting to build around the stadium even three hours before kick-off! German and Norwegian flags were flying everywhere, as well as the obligatory English flags (which seem to have a habit of appearing at ANY football match, regardless of location or the nationality of the teams involved).
As the game kicked off the weather took a turn for the worse. Dark grey clouds were looming over head, and, after 30 minutes of play and two Germany goals it started raining. The Norwegian women started to rally and soon scored their opening goal, followed soon afterwards by what was thought to be the equaliser, only to have the linesman flag it as offside! In the second half I’m not sure whether the Germans were playing more defensively or the Norwegians were just lacking the needed bit of extra pace, but either way the pace of play was a bit slower. Germany scored their third goal on one of their attacks when the shot deflected off one of the defenders and away from Nordby’s outstretched arms. Norway had a couple of late changes during the closing minutes, most notably a header from Lise Klaveness, but it lacked the pace required to beat the behemoth of a German goalkeeper.
Final Result:
Germany: 3
Norway: 1
The drive back down to Birmingham was a long one… when it rains, it pours. There was even some flash flooding just up the road from Blackburn, in Yorkshire. While in the car we listened to the singles charts on radio 1… how the hell is that bastard frog still at #1 even after 4 weeks!!! What is wrong with this country?!?
Fortunately right after that it was time for Dance Anthems, with Armin Van Buuren as a guest DJ. Shibbeh! So the rest of the drive wasn’t too bad for me (Hanne, however, may disagree ;-)).
And now for Jerry Springer’s final thought:
Take some time to consider your monkeysphere. Yes, most of it is obvious / common sense, but it’s got some great snaps of MONKEYS, people! I was actually thinking about this kind of thing earlier: there was a big reception held in the lobby of the building in which I work. I was trying to get out of the building to pop over to the shop and buy a drink, but there were too many people in my way. Because I didn’t know them and had no idea what they were doing there I had no hesitation whatsoever in cursing and taunting them (all within the confines of my mind, of course). Had I known these people or if they were related to me then I probably wouldn’t have been so quick to bite.
Monkeys… hehehehe.