365 Sporting Days

With Saracens playing in Limerick I had some time to try other things over the weekend, my Saturday started in a quite horrible way with a final visit to the vet for my little dog, Shirley. I spent the afternoon with my grandsons for some much needed joy.

I stuck to my plans for the Sunday however and drove to the Kingsmeadow Stadium in Kingston to watch some women’s football. This was a first for me, I did’t really know what to expect.

I bought my ticket after coming across an advert on Twitter, it cost me just £9.00. I was interested to see what the crowd was like, the crowd of 3,498 was very mixed. There were mothers and children and fathers and sons/daughters along, the cost was only one pound for children. I had a lady sat next to me who had a season ticket for both Chelsea and Arsenal Women at a total cost of just over £100. She was clearly very knowledgeable about the players and the game.

Sat behind me were 3 friends who’d travelled from Wembley and Southend, they all watched and supported the mens’ game, but again clearly knew their stuff when it came to the women’s game. We chatted at half time and their view was very interesting, they felt that if this game was properly marketed it could draw fans away from the over priced main event. Getting hold of Premiership Football tickets is hard, then if you can find tickets they cost a fortune in general.

There was a good atmosphere, fans had travelled to watch Man City and both sets of fans sang throughout. What there wasn’t was any bad language or worrying behaviour.

On the pitch I saw skill, good awareness, and total commitment. England captain Steff Houghton was the stand out player for the visitors and Ji So Yun, a South Korea international for Chelsea.

The game was a little slow to get going, but things really took off in the second half. Man City scored through Caroline Weir (A Scottish international) after 59 minutes. Chelsea responded with 2 goals in 2 minutes with Bethany England scoring the first and Mren Mjelde with the second.

I thoroughly enjoyed the game and will definitely go again, if you love the game I can highly recommend watching women’s football.