Something strange has happened - I have become a full on England supporter. Now, don't get me wrong here, I've always 'supported' England in the sense that I like to see Liverpool players do well. I think it's a general 'scouse' feeling about the national team, as one banner unfurled on the Kop once read 'We're not English, we're Scouse'.
But here, in Montreal earlier tonight, I genuinely had the BEST experience of my life supporting England as they beat Colombia 2-1 to progress to the World Cup Round of 16 in 2nd place in their group.
Let's go back to the start of the day first, up early, fruit loops for breakfast before - you guessed it - Netflix in my room for a few hours. I met up with Nic, Mosh, Soph, Rachel & Bec for lunch and then we got the metro to the game.
On our train there was a couple of Colombian supporters, upon getting off the train there was hundreds of them. I have no idea where they all came from but suffice to say we were greatly outnumbered.
Face paint on & into the stadium, Montreal's Olympic Stadium has a roof - which creates a strange sort of atmosphere. Anthems sung, Colombia's support sounding fantastic on theirs.
We take the lead around 15 minutes in, through Karen Carney then Fara Williams made it 2-0 from the penalty spot - I'm going to leave the football stuff for the match report that will be on the blog tomorrow at some point.
The atmosphere was mad, the Colombians were loud but for the second half we sang and sang and sang, around 80 minutes our voices began to crack but we soldiered onto full-time! I can barely talk right now, my throat is that sore.
We cheered the team bus out afterwards and went for food. Class day, class night, great company.
Finding it hard to put it into words the feeling of how proud I was of the England performance. I thought we were great, Fara was excellent (official FIFA Player of the Match!!), Karen Bardsley was strong - a shame to concede in the last minute - Carney & Jade Moore were tireless, as was Fran Kirby, Toni Duggan, Alex Greenwod... Steph Houghton solid - I don't have a bad word to say about any player. They were boss.
With finishing second in the group, England now face Norway in Ottawa on Monday so that's where I'll be headed! Before then I have an action-packed few days, tomorrow it's Toronto & the CN Tower, Friday Niagara Falls and then Sunday watching France v Korea here in Montreal before getting the train to Ottawa on Monday to cheer on the mighty Lionesses! Bring. It. On.
No comments:
Post a Comment