Heia Viking! My first Norwegian Football match

Recently I was attended my first ever Norwegian football game, now I have resisted ever writting about football on this blog as its probably not the right forum for it but it in this case I will make an exception. To give a little background, I am a big football fan and support the Royals of Reading who wear blue and white hoops. Sadly they have just been relegated from the Premier league but hopefully shall return soon.

When I first moved to Norway I wanted to try and follow Norwegian football, partly just because I love watching any type of football but also because the Norwegian football calender runs through the summer with the large break in the winter meaning it could provide some ideal entertainment when English football is having its big break in the summer. The most obvious team for me to follow would have been Bergens team, called Brann, meaning fire. Alternatively though I have pledged my alegence to Viking of Stavanger. The reasoning is pretty simple, most football fans I know from Bergen arnt actually big into Norwegian football and follow English football instead. The only real big followers I know of Norwegian football is my group of friends from Stavanger who are naturally all big Viking supporters. Given that I was certainly the only Reading fan in Bergen I did not also want to be a lonley Brann fan as my Bergen friends did not watch them much, but if I chose Viking I could watch games with friends and soak up there passion. I could also mention that Viking play in blue and white and Brann in red so im keeping with my colours but this is more just a handy coincidence.

So there we have it I am offially a Viking gutt (Viking boy) and I have watched several games on tv with friends and really enjoyed it. The standard is of course pretty poor generally but seeing as Im used to watching Reading in the Championship (second teir of English football) its not much of a stretch and I can still really enjoy it.

Recently was a big date in the Norwegian football calender as Brann of Bergen hosted Viking of Stavanger, as the two large cities on the west coast this is a pretty strong rivelry and I jumped at the chance to attend. The atmosphere and everything was basically identical to going to a game in England and given it was the first year in five I had not attended a Reading game all season I was set to make the most of this. Brann's ground has a capacity of around 17,000 and attendance for the day was nearly 12,000. About 500 of those being Viking supporters crammed into the corner of the oldest stand at the ground. The atmosphere in the away section pre-game was actually brilliant with a couple of crazy guys standing in front leading the chants and waving gigantic flags.

The game itself was sadly a disapointing result with Viking going a goal down just 3 minutes in and conceding another 15 minutes later which would be the final of the day ending the game 2-0 to the home side. Despite this though it was still a great day out, I'm really glad I went and I'm looking forward to my next game.

We got there very early, I can assure you it did fill up nicely. I like this picture as it shows what I feel to be three quite interesting things about the stadium:

1. The stands are simple but nice. About 10 years ago when my girlfriend went to her first and last ever football match she said there were no seats and just concrete steps, fortunatly there have been upgrades

2. The condition of the pitch was pretty shocking. One must bare in mind the weather has only just turned warm but it is also very early in the season so I was surprised.

3. As always in Bergen, you cant go anywhere without sseeing mountains. Pretty sure from no stadium in England can you see  mountains in the distance.