Waiting For The Bus

Los Campeones returned to Madrid last night, and of course we had to go to see it. We had no idea what was going to happen, all we knew was that it would be a good idea to be at Plaza de Colón by about 8pm. As it happened, we were there at 7.30, along with a sizeable crowd, a big stage, big video screens and a perfectly adequate sound system.



We were entertained by several bands that we'd never heard of, and an enterprising dude was doing good business painting Spanish flags on peoples' faces - although it did look like he was using acrylic paint, which is a bugger to get off.





The team's plane touched down at 8pm, and after about fifteen minutes they set off on the slowest-ever bus trip from the airport - it took over an hour for them to reach Colón, but everyone was quite pleased when they did. The National Library of Spain sits on a corner of the Plaza, and these security guys on the roof got a pretty good view.



A few minutes before the actual arrival, the Spanish Air Force Aerobatics Team flew over our heads trailing yellow and red smoke.



Then finally, the bus arrived. In the photo below, do you see the yellow blob to the left of the kid in the blue t-shirt? That's the Cup! (Actually it might be Luis Aragones, but it's hard to tell from this distance).



Once again, a bloody fantastic experience: thank you Madrid, thank you Spain!

And I promise you, a complete change of topic tomorrow.

Si Hicimos [Yes, We Did]

The last time I was in a country that won a major international tournament was 1966 in England. I was 9 years old. Now I'm 50, and Spain have won the Euro 2008 tournament. Amazing, incredible, estupendo. I cannot begin to describe the atmosphere here in Madrid tonight. There have been at least three major firework displays, we wandered around waving our Spanish flags and fans for an hour or so, the square below us is packed with noisy people and I don't think any of them will leave until the Metro opens at 6am.

Fantasic. Just fantastic.

Podemos - You Bet Your Ass

Oh my Gawd. Spain just beat Russia 3-0 in the semi-final of the EuroCopa. Spain played brilliantly, full of confidence and skill.

I've become aware, as this tournament has gone on, that a lot of Spaniards doubted the ability of their national team to get beyond the group stage. But this time it's different. Oh boy is it different! Spain now face Germany in the final on Sunday. Spain played a brilliant game today, and while I'm not going to predict that they will beat Germany in the final, I certainly think that they can and I hope that they will. Time will tell.

A Most Confusing Evening

There was supposed to be nothing happening in the EuroCopa yesterday and the day before. So MamaDuck and I decided that we would go to the Writerz Groop last night after she finished work. As it turned out, she had an almost total no-show and so her last class was cancelled. I was mooching around town, and had just bought the DVD of 'The Golden Compass'. We tried to see this film around Christmas time, but it was only on at one V.O. cinema, and only for about 2 showings. When we turned up for the second one they'd changed the timing and we'd bloody missed it. Ah well.

Anyhoo, we had some time to kill before the Writerz Groop, so we went into a bar. To our astonishment, there was football on one of the tellies. It was Spain versus Russia, and Spain were winning. But the sound was off, and nobody was paying the slightest bit of attention. We were totally baffled: I was sure this game was supposed to happen on Thursday. We decided to leave at half-time, jump into a taxi and go home to watch the rest of it with the sound turned up.

So, we got home, I set up the telly on the terrace, and furiously zapped the zapper to find the match. Couldn't find it - surely it's not just on satellite channels? And then we checked the Internet. There were no games scheduled for Tuesday night. Spain play Russia on Thursday. Eventually we realised - what we'd seen was a repeat of the group stage match between Russia and Spain - I'd already forgotten that match (very easy to do when you reach my age), and had assumed that only a dimwit would organise a tournament in such a way that the same two teams could play each other twice. Bummer.

Having got the telly all set up, I decided that I would watch The Golden Compass, which is based on the first part of Philip Pullman's brilliant 'His Dark Materials' trilogy. I re-read the trilogy a month ago, and I think this probably spoilt the film for me because the story was fresh in my mind, and so the mangling and omissions in the movie were quite apparent. I'll be generous and say the film was 'a huge disappointment'.

Podemos, Si [We Can, Yes]

Spain played their Eurocopa quarter-final tonight, against Italy. I was unaware, until a few days ago, that Spain have not beaten Italy since 1920. So there was a bit of a psychological fear factor. The game itself was as boring as hell. Both sides opted for serious defensive tactics, as a result of which there was precious little attacking to deal with. So, no goals at the end of 90 minutes, and none after half an hour extra time. Damn penalties. Happily, Spain won, and I hope that this gives them the confidence to actually get out there and play the football they are capable of.

We went up to Plaza de Colón after the match. This is where fans can watch games on massive screens, and where they celebrate afterwards. Paseo de Recoletos (a main road leading into the Plaza) was jammed with fans and cars draped in Spanish flags, beeping their horns and not expecting to be able to actually go anywhere. The atmosphere was stupendous. And it's still going on at 1.15am. I don't suppose it will end until they all run out of petrol.

Spain's next match is against Russia. I hope the team have finally got the message. 'Yes, we can.'

EuroWrestling 2008

I've never watched so much football in my life! I've seen at least one, sometimes two games each night for the last week, and this will continue until the end of June (well, ok, once we're done with the group stage, there's only one game per day).

I've seen some very entertaining footie, and a lot more goals than you might expect. I've also witnessed some outrageous shirt-pulling, body-hugging, arm-barring, hair-pulling, pushing, shoving and anything else deemed necessary to stop your opponent from reaching the ball. Either all of this kind of stuff is now legal, or I have better eyesight than the match officials. The latter might be true, actually, given that professional quality TV cameras now cost €5.95 for six, and there are probably a dozen cameras filming each match; all with the benefit of slow-motion action replay.

The poor referee and his mates only have four pairs of eyes to rely on.

A couple of days ago I saw a pretty blatant example of this wrestle-ball, but I can't remember which game it was. Two guys were racing for the ball. One of them realised he had no chance of getting it, so he just pushed his opponent over. He got one of those lovely yellow cards for his pains, but surely he should have been sent off?

In the dying minutes of last night's match between CzechRep and Turkey, the Turkish goalie was sent off for doing something very similar. He seemed to be astonished at the punishment. I think it might be time for video evidence to be used during games whenever a questionable situation arises, because the simple fact is that match officials simply cannot see everything that happens. The mantra that 'the referee's decision is final, even if it's wrong', is outmoded and unfair in this technological age.

My 2 centimos' worth.

UPDATE

I forgot to mention the bizarre booking of a non-participating player last night (either a substitute or a player who had been taken off). But 10 minutes ago, I watched in disbelief as the managers of Austria and Germany were dismissed from the sidelines and had to go sit in the stands! Unreal. And I have no idea why that happened.

Si, Podemos [Yes, We Can]

I'm thrilled to bits that Barack Obama will be the Democratic candidate in the next US Presidential election, with his slogan 'yes, we can'. This post isn't about that, though, it's about footie. I was somewhat disgusted that England failed to qualify for Euro 2008 last summer, but now I'm here in Madrid. It's a no-brainer. I'll support Portugal Spain. I've watched two games in the last two days, but today was The Big One. Spain's first game in the tournament, against Russia. I was amazed to discover that this tournament is being shown free-to-air on Cuatro. I can get that on my new telly. Brilliant! I don't know if this EuroCopa has a theme song, but the Cuatro coverage has this tag-line: 'podemos' (we can). I lurve it.

I discovered a few hours before the match that it was being shown for free in Plaza de Colon - a ten-minute walk from here. But I figured it might be a bit busy, so I gave it a miss. I set the telly up on a table on the terrace, and was able to see and hear it, with the added bonus of the roars from Colon whenever things got exciting. It was almost like being in a stadium - apparently there were about a quarter of a million people in Pl de Colon. It was an exciting game, and Spain beat Russia 4-1. A sensational start. Can we win it?

Si. Podemos.