With Derry back in Europe this year, a number of the Dublin SC decided to do a pre-European Tour warm up, and headed over to Madrid for the weekend to watch the Atletico de Madrid v Osasuna game on Sunday. It was also billed as Stephen "El Grande" Large's stag weekend, but he is still yet to admit to that.
NOTE: All text in RED are hyperlinks to the photos giving validity to the story
The four brave souls who travelled were:
And as always, this write up will focus less on the match report and more on the comic antics of the Dublin SC Members.
The reason for picking the Atletico game was quite simple, they play in the Candy Stripes, like our very own Derry City FC, so we were able to go to the game with our Derry home tops on.
Well the weekend kicked off at 5am Friday morning when we arrived at Dublin airport for our flight out to Madrid at 6.20am. We quickly got checked in and got through security, and even had time for a quick beer before boarding the plane.
On the plane, the scene was set for the weekend, with me opening and mouth and firmly lodging my foot into it. We were having a discussion about what other games we could go to in Europe over the next few years, and some mentioned heading to Germany, specifically Munich so that we could take in the beer festival. As you all will probably know, the festival is called Oktoberfest, and brains here asked when was it on, and so the weekend kicked off.
We landed in Madrid around 11.45am and the sun was splitting the sky, like it would for the rest of the weeknd, and it was a balmy 23 Degrees - perfect for Derry lads.
We got the Metro to the hotel, and it has to be said, it is a great system, the hotel was probably 15 miles from the Airport and it only took 40 minutes on the Metro to get to the stop near the hotel. Check-in to the hotel was another comic moment, albeit from the hotel receptionist this time playing the role of comic. We checked to two room and had to have a passport registered to each room, the 3 lads were travelling on their Irish passports, and me be a lazy git was travelling on my British, and the clerk asked why the difference and Big Daddy explained we were all from Northern Ireland, and the clerk jokingly said "So is it Derry or Londonderry" to which the reply was "Derry" and we explained we were all from Derry, although I'm sure some funny git might have suggested I was from the latter.
The hotel was the Hotel Praga situated close to the Estadio Vicente Calderon for the match, and it was a bargain for the price paid. Well, we headed to the rooms to dump the bags and get the shorts on and head out and take a look around.
Our first stop was to get a beer and a snack, which for 4 glasses of beer and two plates of tapas came in at a nice sound of €5, which we were well impressed with. Then over to the stadium to take a look around the stadium and take a nosey into the club shop, were I managed to pick up a Atletio benny hat - a small hobby of mine, collecting benny hats from different clubs I go to. Now of course, this is OK when living in Ireland, but Spain, although, the benny hat did protect my balding head from the sun.
After a brave bit of walking, Scoops headed for a siesta, whereas Big Daddy, El Grande and myself headed off into town for a nosey around, the purpose of finding an Irish bar that was showing the Bohs v Cork game. So an internet cafe was found and Irish bars scouted, so we headed of to the James Joyce, well we thought we were heading there, with El Grande's great sense of direction and previous knowledge of Madrid. Well 2 miles later, walking in the wrong direction, we figured out a wrong turn coming out of the Internet cafe may have been taken, let it be said, there's nothing slow about the Dublin SC Members. So we decided to head back on the Metro, and another wrong turn was taken, leading us to do an additional two hops on the metro, I won't say anyone was at fault here, but as always, there was one man walking in front of the rest of us.
So, finally we reached James Joyce, got a nice cold pint and asked the barman were they showing the League of Ireland game on RTE 2. With the barman being an English Bloke we may of well have been asking for directions to Tallaght, for the look on his face and the fact we had to explain what we were asking, and we were denied, no match being shown. After that we hit another few Irish pubs, with names like O'Reillys, The Dubliner, O'Connell Street, until we found a bar that had RTE and would stick on the match. So Scoops was called to meet up with us and we sat down to a bite to eat and waited on kick-off, to find that, although the bar had RTE2 listed on Sky, they didn't get it, so the bar got 4 lads in drinking and eating for a few hours under false pretences - bummer. After that, we ended up back at the hotel exhausted from a long day.
Saturday, we hit the stadium again to pick up the match tickets and some more shopping in the club shop, and then we headed into town to do the touristy stuff you're supposed to do whilst on hols. The first site we hit was the Plaza Major, a square with side alleys leading into it, and a large number of cafe's. After a quick Google, the main aspect of it seems to be bull fighting, although after seeing some details on it, it would be impressive to see it at night lit up.
Next up, we decided to find an internet cafe and see if Real was playing in Madrid, but on the way we ran into a group of Tenerife fans over for a 2nd Division clash against Rayo Vallecano de Madrid, a 1st v. 4th game. So we found out where and when it was on, and headed to get fuelled up before heading to the match. We ended up in a wee pub close to all the Irish bars we were in the night before. The food was excellent, (if Big Daddy was writing this update, the next 20 paragraphs would explain what excellent food meant) the beer, non-alcohol for some, although it was good to wind up Big Daddy that we were all drinking it, was tasty, and the bill for about 6 plates of Tapas and 3 or 4 beer each was only €50. And also with the bill came a shot of liquor each, which kinda tasted like that pink medicine you had to swallow as a kid.
Then it was just a hop on the Metro and out to the ground, and this time round, coming out of the Metro, a left turn at the top of the steps and we were at the stadium. So we checked out a few stalls, and I ended up getting a Rayo benny hat (Benny Hat Count 2 - 3 if you included the DCFC one I had been wearing early Friday morning getting to the Airport) and Scoops picked up a Red & White barred scarf and we headed of to get tickets. The Rayo stands were sold out, so we got tickets for the Tenerfie stand, so the Rayo benny hat disappeared, after the ticket seller pointed it out.
So, before the match we headed over to a bar with a load of Tenerife fans, and got talking to a few, a lot of Scots ex-pats followed them as they wore the Scottish colours, and throw in a whack of English and Welsh ex-pats as well. All told they bought 800 fans over from Tenerife for the game.
So 4 bottles of beer were bought, at €8 a round, and a table was grabbed for us to chill before the match. Some how the table arrangements ended up as Scoops on one side of the table and El Grande, Big Daddy and The Child on the other. After about 3 beer, Big Daddy pointed out that Scoops looked like a Mafia don, on the far side of the table, and that’s when Graeme "Scoops" Taylor got his Dublin SC nickname of El Don.
So after the beer, it was time to head over to the game and cheer on Tenerife. The stadium was a nice wee stadium that held 15,000 (damn I wish we had a nice wee stadium in them terms) and it was full for the top of the table clash. As always, the match report can be found on another site, but it was a good game, ending in 0-0 and Tenerife had a few handy players of note. Also, click here to see one of the funniest footie flags I have yet to see. Good crowd banter at the match and some free flowing football, even some chants we could understand and add our voices to.
After the match, it was back to the hotel to relax for a hour or and get the glad rags on to head out for a few beer on the Saturday night. We ended up in the same area as the night before, but this time round we hit the Spanish bars for the local beer and food. After a bite to eat, we ended up in a small side street bar, with Big Daddy and El Don drinking pitchers of Sangria. Half way down the first, Big Daddy mentioned that he thought the frog was talking to him, at which point the rest of us were lost, until he pointed to the tiled walls with small green frogs on the tiles - Sangria - great for drinking stories.
Shortly after that, and without The Child asking for it, there was a Family Planning Conference held for Will "The Child" McCann. Here, El Don, El Grande & Big Daddy decided that it would be good for The Child to have twins in the near future who'd grow up and play on the left and right wings for Derry, and the twins were then promptly named Jose & Juan, which said together role off the tongue as Jose Juan McCann. And being a good Family Planning Conference that it was, it was decided that my future chat up lines should go along the lines of "Was your da any good at football" and if the answer is Yes, "Do twins run in your family". How nice of the lads to be so obliging, and also land me with my 2nd Dublin SC nickname of Will "Jose Juan" McCann. Thanks lads.
Sunday - match day - game on - Derry home tops on. The match kicked off at 5pm, so just to make sure we got there on time, we headed up around 12pm. And some stalls were up already selling scarfs and hats, and of course I spotted another Benny Hat of interest, a Red & White hoops, so I went up to get that when one of the lads pointed out an even better one, a Red & White Candy Striped benny hat - oh yes. (Benny Hat Count: Atletico 2, Ray 1, Derry 1). So that that, a bar was found for lubrication for the vocal cords and a bite to eat. There was some funny looks, with the 4 of us wearing the Derry tops, and some stares and comments made. After we fuelled up again, it was back down to the club shop for the lads to pick up Atletico tops and El Grande and Scoops got their names printed on the back, with some sniggers and laughs at Scoops, but we have yet to find out what it means in Spanish. Then another bar was found, and we chilled in the sun for a few hours and a few beer was had.
A few more chats with Atletico fans were had to explain the Derry tops and why we were over to catch the match. Then game time, we headed over to the stadium, which holds 55,000. We got great seats on the south stand (or maybe north - I don't know) on the top tier down at the front. Match report to follow in the next 2 lines. With 3 of us also being Man U fans it was good to see Diego Forlan on the pitch for kick-off. The game itself was end to end entertainment with Osasuna winning 4-2 with some awful defending by Atletico, and we did get to see Diego score a goal to make it 1-1. Although at one stage of the match I was getting worried about a lone sniper being in the stands, with the amount of diving happening on the pitch.
Big Daddy also ended up talking to some of the fans and again explaining the Derry tops and that we were from Ireland, and here he was asked whether we were Catholic or Protestant, Catholic being the reply, but it's weird the tangents these conversations can go off on.
Well, after the match, we headed off got a bite to eat and relaxed, as an early rise was planned for the return home on Monday morning. As always heading home is not as much fun as heading away. But on the metro to the airport, another meeting of the McCann Family Planning Conference was held, were it was decided my 3rd child would be Derry's left back and would be aptly named Benny.
So, after being delayed in in Airport, we finally got back into Dublin at 2pm on Monday, with Stephen "El Grande" Large leading the charge through the airport, when El Don finally came up with Stephen’s Dublin SC nickname, so we now have Stephen "Bolt" Large.
There's some hyperlinks above with pics, but all my pics can be found here - http://picasaweb.google.com/willymccann/AtleticoDeMadridVOsasuna?feat=directlink and El Don's pics can be found here - http://picasaweb.google.com/scoopsy/StephenBoltLargeSStag#
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