Olympics - part 3

GREAT BRITAIN 1-1 REPUBLIC OF KOREA

(after extra time; 4-5 on penalty kicks)

Men's Football Tournament - Quarter Final

Saturday 4th August 2012

Millennium Stadium, Cardiff

My third and final London 2012 Olympic experience is a three hundred mile round trip to Cardiff. The Millennium Stadium is one stadium that I have been wanting to visit for a while, so when the chance came up to get some tickets for a game here, I opted for this over another quarter final at St. James' Park in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Like for the games the previous week at Coventry I went for the cheapest tickets which came in at £20 each.

The Millennium Stadium was built in 1999 and replaced the old National Stadium which stood on the same site. It has a capacity of 74,500 and the first event at the new stadium was on the 26th June 1999 when Wales beat South Africa 29-19 in a rugby union international. The total cost of construction of the stadium was £121m and is owned by Millennium Stadium Plc, which is a subsidiary company of the Welsh Rugby Union. The stadium is home to the Welsh national rugby union team, but also hosts Welsh national football games and the Speedway Grand Prix of Great Britain.

As we would be driving down to Cardiff I checked on the stadium's official website in regard to parking etc, and the advise was to contact Cardiff council to reserve a space for the park-and-ride facility at Cardiff City Football Club. An e-mail was sent on the 13th June requesting a reservation  with the reply coming just a day later confirming this. We arrived at the park-and-ride facility at around 5pm with no problems on route after stopping on route to watch another game of football - a 1st round tie in the Gwent Senior Cup between Newport Civil Service and Monmouth Town at the Civil Service Sports Ground at Bettws.  The reservation we had was not needed and the process was like in London yesterday, smooth and efficient.

After getting off the bus on the other side of the stadium to our entrance point the heavens opened, and boy did it rain. Impressive is about the best way I can describe the Millennium Stadium. Even though it is thirteen years old it is not showing any signs of it, and it is a fantastic sight. We had tickets for the back of the bottom tier near the corner flag, and despite this we had a good view of the pitch.

Unfortunately the game did not match the stadium and the atmosphere with it being an absolute stinker. In fact it is doubtful I will see a worse game all season. The GB team looked devoid of any idea how to break the Koreans down, though their opponents were not much better. Korea settled quicker and looked dangerous with GB goalkeeper Jack Butland making a flying save. It came as no surprise when they took the lead on twenty-nine minutes with a Ji Dongwon shot going through the arms of Butland. The lead lasted just seven minutes as the home nation were awarded a penalty. Arsenal midfielder Aaron Ramsey stepped up and levelled the scores. A few minutes later and another penalty was awarded to GB but Ramsey had his spot kick saved. 

There was an air of inevitability that the game would be decided by kicks from the penalty spot and this proved to be the case. The first eight were all successfully converted before Daniel Sturridge had his saved by Lee Bumyoung. This left Ki Sungyueng to win the game and he made no mistake to give Korea a sem-final match with Brazil.

When the game ended we decided to walk back to the park & ride which took us about twenty minutes, and we were back on the M4 soon afterwards and home in Leicester at 1am

Another long but enjoyable day and this completes my London 2012 Olympic experience.

Photos of the Millennium Stadium can be viewed in the first slideshow, while ones of the afternoon game at Newport Civil Service FC in the second:



   

Olympics - part 2

Women's Handball Competition - Group B

Friday 3rd August 2012

Copper Box Arena

Like previously stated in part 1 it was my intention to get tickets for an event at the Olympic Park itself, but following the original ballot and secondary sales I was unable to get anything other than for football. It was always my intention to keep trying as I had an inkling that some of the other national Olympic associations would send back unsold tickets, and also that once the seating plans were finalised the organisers would hopefully have more tickets to go on sale. As luck would have it a few months ago some more tickets went on sale and managed to get some for the Women's Handball Tournament. I had to pay top whack for the tickets which came in @ £50 each, but as this is something that would never be experienced again and certainly not in my home country, two were purchased for myself and my wife Angela. 

To get down to London we decided to go on the train from Leicester as I did not fancy driving, mainly due to working a night shift. To help matters I managed to get my Thursday night shift changed from a 10-6 to an 8-4 one, which meant I would get home around 4.15am on the Friday morning. In the end I got home This allowed me to get some sleep before having to go and get the pre-booked train out of Leicester at 1155. The train tickets to London St. Pancras cost £34 return each, and with a midday departure would allow us plenty of time to get to the Olympic Park in time for our event which was not due to start until 1930. The train arrived in Leicester on time and got us into St. Pancras at the scheduled time of 1315. It was then a case of going to the other side of the station to catch the Javelin service to Stratford International - a six minute journey across London. 

The Olympic Rings @ St. Pancras Station

On arrival we made our way into the Westfield Stratford shopping centre which is adjacent to the Olympic Park, which for this weekend only was only for athletes, officials and people with tickets for any of the events etc etc due to it being the busiest weekend of the games helped by the athletic events starting. After spending around an hour and half in the shopping centre buying a few souvenirs and other odds and sods we made our way into the park. Getting through security was effortless, very efficient and well organised and took no time at all.

myself @ the entrance to the Olympic Park

We in the park you are greeted by the impressive site of the Olympic Stadium in front of you, the Aquatics Centre to the left, the Water Polo Arena to the right plus not forgetting the Orbit. Having spent some time getting our bearings and having a look round we went to the Coca Cola stall and had our photo taken with the Olympic Torch - monies of which go to the companies' respective charities. Then it was about turn and we went in the direction of the Copper Box Arena itself which is located in the middle of the park between the Olympic Stadium and Riverbank Arena. With stomachs rumbling and time getting on we thought it would be a good idea to get something to eat before heading into the Copper Box. Queues for all food outlets were large and prices high. In the end we opted for the fish and chip option - a wait of around thirty minutes saw us fork out £22.60 for two portions and two 500ml bottles of drink, and then it was onto the nearby Copper Box for the main event.

Orbit

Handball is a sport I know very little about, and only decided to get tickets for this after watching some clips on youtube. Teams consist of teams of seven (six outfield players and a goalkeeper) and matches are contested over two periods of thirty minutes. More details on the sport can be found on the governing body's website, the IHF.

Matches for the handball tournament will take place at two venues; 1) the Copper Box Arena and 2) the Basketball Arena. The Copper Box is a permanent venue that has a capacity of 7,000. After the games it will become a multi-use sports centre for community use and will be operated by Greenwich Leisure Limited. On the other hand the Basketball Arena is a temporary venue and will have a capacity of 12,000. Along with basketball it will also host to semi-finals and final of the handball tournament. 

I was really impressed with the Copper Box (inside and out), and full credit to the designers / architects who came up with it. There is not a bad seat in the house and the atmosphere and acoustics were superb. The seats we had were behind the far goal and about eight rows up. 

Unusually for me I did not check how all four teams were doing in the tournament so far, but going into the games the world rankings of the four nations involved are as follows:

3 - Denmark; 6 - Sweden; 9 - Spain; 11 - Norway 

On this evidence I predictably came to the conclusion that both games would be close encounters, and this proved to be oh so correct though the victories went to the lower (world) ranked nations. 

Game 1
Spain 25-24 Sweden

Spain won this by opening up a two goal lead with about a minute to go, though Sweden did get the last goal of the game. Nely Alberto and Marta Mangue top scored for Spain with six goals each, while Hanna Fogelstrom scored five for Sweden. Spain's victory was in no small park helped by their goalkeeper Silvia Navarro who made fourteen saves during the match.

Game 2
Denmark 22-23 Norway

This all Scandinavian affair saw Norway beat Denmark with a winning goal with just two seconds left. The game was nip and tuck throughout with Ann Norgaard scoring nine goals for the Danes and Heidi Loke top scoring for Norway with six. The winning goal came from Karoline Breivang.

Summing up, my impression of the sport is one that is really entertaining with it being fast paced and physical. I would happily pay to watch this again and I cannot understand why this sport has never taken off in this country. In fact handball is now one of my favourite sports and comes very close a second behind football.

Admission: £50 each

Programme: no Handball ones available

Olympic Stadium @ night

After leaving the arena we paid a visit to the megastore as I was hoping to get a pin badge of the Copper Box and a programme for the handball tournament, but they had none for sale. 

As you can imagine the queues to get back to Stratford International for the Javelin service back to St. Pancras were large, but the staff had everything organised properly. It all ran smoothly and efficiently and we were back @ St. Pancras in plenty of time before our scheduled departure back to Leicester at 0045. 

Before and during the early part of the games there have been plenty of scaremongering and predicted transport chaos, but the reality was very much different. The image that will be portrayed about London in relation to the games itself and the transport is a very positive one that can only enhance the city and country as a whole. A final note should be to the staff at the games who were all well trained, knowledgeable, polite and very friendly.

A day that we as a couple will never forget and we are so glad that we managed to get tickets so something that will never be experienced again.

More photos of the Olympic Park in general can be viewed in the slideshow below:


...and photos of the Copper Box Arena are below:

Olympics - Part 1

Women's Olympic Football Tournament - Group F

Saturday 28th July 2012

@ City of Coventry Stadium [Ricoh Arena], Coventry

I know a lot of people have been critical of the Olympics being awarded to London, but personally I am massively in favour of it. This opinion is rather obviously swayed by the fact that I love watching sport whether it be cycling, rugby or american football, though it you are reading this association football or soccer is my main passion sports wise. 

Right from the start it was my intention to try and get some tickets for the football tournament plus hopefully some for an event at the Olympic Park. When the original application process for hopefully getting tickets came around, three requests were made: 1) football @ Coventry; 2) handball and 3) athletics. The football was a side issue as I was more interested in the latter two as the chance to experience the Olympics first hand is something that will probably never happen to me again. Rather unsurprisingly the only successful ticket application was for the football and the chance to go down to London for the games was gone. A few months later and some more football tickets were purchased, this time for a men's quarter final at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. Then a few months ago I got in from work one morning and heard on the news that there was to be some more tickets released for sale. Online I went and managed to get two tickets for the handball preliminaries for Friday August 3rd, which after the hassle and then disappointment of the original ballot was very straight forward and simple. Details of the visits to Cardiff and London to follow in parts 2 and 3.

   

For the football tournament I believe originally Villa Park in Birmingham was to be one of the six venues, but the club (Aston Villa) withdrew due to having work done on the pitch during the summer. The Ricoh Arena, or City of Coventry Stadium as it is to be known for the games was chosen as a replacement. I was not fussed as I had not visited either stadium anyway. The tickets that I managed to get were the cheapest available which was £20 and this was for two games. Which nations would be on show was not important but as it turned out we would be watching the current world champions (Japan), Sweden, Canada and South Africa. Women's football has only been an Olympic sport since the 1996 games in Atlanta. The record of the four teams involved today are as follows:

year	Japan	Sweden	Canada	South Africa
1996	1st round	1st round	did not qualify	did not qualify
2000	did not qualify	1st round	did not qualify	did not qualify
2004	quarter finals	4th	did not qualify	did not qualify
2008	4th	quarter final	quarter final	did not qualify

The current FIFA world rankings sees Japan in 3rd place, Sweden in 4th, Canada in 7th and South Africa the rank outsiders in 61st. The opening games in the group were played on Wednesday and both went as expected. Japan beat Canada 2-1 with first half goals from Nahomi Kawasumi and Aya Miyama, with Melissa Tancredi getting the Canadian goal on 55 minutes. Sweden went top of the group with a 4-1 demolition of South Africa. Goals from Nilla Fischer, Lisa Dahlkvist and Lotta Schelin gave them a three goal cushion at half time. A Portia Modise goal on the hour mark pulled a goal back, but Sweden's three goal advantage was restored three minutes later when Schelin got her second goal of the game.  

The stadium is very easy to find being only a short distance off junction 3 of the M6. It opened in 2005 and has a capacity of 32,609. Parking around the stadium for the matches were for either officials or if spectators had reserved it in advance. Considering the attendance was less than half the originally stated capacity organisers seemed to struggle with this. In the end we parked about 3/4 mile away near to the M6 motorway.

The security aspect was something that has been well documented in the press leading up to the games, and this (in my opinion) over-the-top approach was how it was. All possessions which including credit cards, cameras and even money had to be put in clear plastic bags to get into the stadium. When inside the stadium the majority of people simply put their possessions back into their own bag(s) and discarded the plastic ones. 

The atmosphere inside was that of a friendly and party nature with plenty of families in attendance along side the visitors from the four countries involved as well as the more hardened football fans. Not surprisingly the Japanese had the largest following spectator wise and number of photographers. Chants of "Nippon Nippon" broke out numerous times during their game against Sweden. Some of the Canadians were quite creative with their comments, with "there's only one Justin Bieber" in particular. During the second half the football team was amusingly nicknamed "The Biebers", though I somehow doubt that Canadian Football Association will make it official!!!! 

 Game 1
JAPAN 0-0 SWEDEN

This was the better of the two games despite the lack of goals. The Japanese dominated the game for the most parts and showed why they are the world champions. The passing, movement and one touch football were a pleasure to watch and left the Swedes chasing shadows. Despite their dominance the only saves Sweden keeper Hedvig Lindahl were comfortable and did not give her much concern. Sweden had both a height and physical advantage but on the times they did get forward the Japanese defence looked assured and dealt with things with the minimum of fuss.

Game 2
CANADA 3-0 SOUTH AFRICA

Any doubts about a second nil-nil of the afternoon were put to bed very quickly as the Canadians opened the scoring on seven minutes. A ball across from the right was guided past the South African keeper by Melissa Tancredi, though having seen the goal again to tv I thought Thokozile Mndaweni should have done better to keep the ball out. My consensus then was that the Canadians would push on and increase their advantage, but the South Africans got into the game more with Mpumi Nyandeni being dangerous. The South Africans nearly equalised following a mix up in the Canadian defence but the ball hit the top of the bar and went over. The second half saw the South Africans come at the Canadians but just before the hour mark it was 2-0. A cross from the left was headed goal wards by Christine Sinclair. It hit the underside of the bar and appeared to cross the line, but Sinclair reacted quickest to make sure. It was then only a matter of time before Canada increased their lead further and with seven minutes remaining Sinclair got her second of the afternoon. A through ball pierced the South African defence and she coolly beat Mndaweni with a low side footed shot.

Admission: £20 
Programme: £5 (football tournament)
Attendance: 14,753   


Some more photos of the ground and fans can be viewed below: