A highlight for many sport fans is a trip to Old Trafford to watch Manchester United play football, err soccer. The problem is that tickets can be hard to come by. However, a colleague of mine wasn't using his tickets for a match against newly promoted Norwich City FC, so I happily snapped them up. This couldn't have been better timing because it was same weekend my brother Zac was in town for a whirl wind visit.
From London it's about a 2 hour train ride north to Manchester. On the train we sat across from a father and son who make the trip for every home game. Beside being avid fans and telling us about this game or that game over the years, they told us about a pre-game tradition of eating Chips and Gravy. Now before you start thinking potato chips, let me clarify. They were talking about chunky french fries. You can see Zac above, looking slightly unamused holding two portions, including one with an additional topping of mushy peas. That's Old Trafford in the background.



One thing to note is that there are rules to abide by in your seats. First, no alcohol. Who'd of thought, but it's needed to make sure people don't get out of control. It can get heated in the stands between the home and away fans. Second, photography is limited to point and shoots! I started to argue with the security guy who took offense to my camera but I decided I'd rather watch the game. Plus Zac told me to shut up and pointed he didn't want to get kicked out of the stadium. Thanks bro!
All in all, it was a good way to spend the afternoon on a fantastic day in Manchester.
The only thing left to do was to head into the center of Manchester and celebrate the win before our late night train home. We meet a good friend of mine in town who showed us around. Surprisingly, Zac made finding a pub harder than you'd think. Notice his ManU jersey above? On game days pubs have a decision to make. They can do 1 of 3 things. Allow home team fans in, allow away team fans in, or neither. We weren't allowed into the first two pubs, both not allowing either team fans in, before finally finding a United supporting pub. Again, who'd of thought, but its for safety. Too many drunken fights I guess.
Well, rowdy turned out to be the theme of the day. On the packed train ride home there were quite a few loud rowdy fans from the game. The dinning car was closed and numerous announcements had to be made that calumniated in the police waiting on our train platform as the train pulled into London Euston. It wasn't us! Rock!
Here are a few more photos on Flickr.
Here are a few more photos on Flickr.
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