Saturday, November 26, 2005

Arsenal vs Blackburn @ Highbury, London

We spent the morning with the Upcrofts in Portobello Market, walking distance from their place.  WE found a pub later where we met Saffa, Gretchen, Kerns for a drink.  Then A, Rob, Kern & I caught the train out to Highbury to see Arsenal v Blackburn.


Kern had bought tickets off a workmate.  I couldn't believe we were 7 rows from the pitch, behind the goal, at the Arsenal end.  It was amazing.  We saw Fabregas and Henry give Arsenal a 2-0 lead before the break.  Before the game Robbie was warned not to say anything positive about   Blackburn, despite the fact there were 2 Aussies on the field, Lucas Neil and Brett Emerton, we were not at home at the local footy, and the English take their support seriously.  SO when he said he wished Blackburn scored to make it more interesting, we did the right thing...and turned our backs on him like he was a stranger.  He later said the guy behind him looked ready to kill.  He was warned.  Eventually we were rewarded with a beautiful Van Persie goal at our end in the 90th minute.  Arsenal 3-0 winners.  All 4 of us got to leave the stadium in 1 piece.

Arsenal 3 (Fabregas 4, Henry 45, Van Persie 90) defeated Blackburn 0

Crowd: 38,192

Arsenal
Jans Lehmann, Lauren, Kolo Toure, Kevin Campbell, Pascal Cygan, Robert Pires (Matthew Flamini 77), Cesc Fabregas, Gilberto Silva, Jose Antonio Reyes (Freddie Ljungberg 72), Dennis Bergkamp (Robin Van Persie 82), Thierry Henry.

Blackburn:
Brad Friedel, Lucas Neill, Ryan Nelsen, Andy Todd, Michael Gray, Brett Emerton (David Thompson 61), Steven Reid, Robbie Savage, Morten Gamst Pedersen, Shefki Kuqi (Paul Dickov 79), Craig Bellamy.

Bob, Me, ABH & Kern @ Highbury

7 Rows Behind The Goal @ Highbury

Kern, Bob, Me & ABH @ Highbury

We ended up in a pub near Highbury station, where we were joined by Tawnie, Linda & K&J.  From there we caught the tube to Angel where we had dinner at Carluccio's.  A quaint Italian restaurant, where we took up a huge table in the middle of everything.  All in all a fantastic day.

No comments:

Post a Comment