Finally got to visit the Emirates after original game had been rescheduled about 3 times from its original date of 30th January. Myself, and a friend had decided to go down and compare the new ground with our own City of Manchester Stadium.

The Emirates is easy to find, travelling down M6, M1 and onto A1 at junction 2. Once there, came the problem of trying to find a car parking place within walking distance of the ground. By chance we saw a sign for a school offering car parking at £10 located on Sussex Way just off the A103 Hornsey Road, about 15mins from stadium. It was at this point that we noticed parking regulations on the adjoining streets were only in force from 10.00am to 2.00pm!, so car was duly parked in the street opposite the school (Landseer Road) for no cost.

Next, where to get a drink? Decided on The Eaglet on the corner of Seven Sisters and Hornsey Road. Pub looks rather grubby from the outside, and not that much better inside. However, atmosphere was friendly and most of all the beer not to pricey - £2.40p for a pint of Carling.

Onto the ground, looks good from main steps leading up to the Stadium with couple of cannons obviously carted over from Highbury. Entrance to stadium was via a card reader, seems a bit low tech after the proximity readers we are used to at our stadium! City fans were located in lower tier in corner of the stadium, ourselves being block 20. Once inside ground the first thing we noticed was that there was ONLY 1 catering outlet that was supposed to cope with up to 3,000 away fans! With half an hour to go before kick off, there was no beer and very little else. At half time beer was back on, but as you can imagine the scenes being chaotic and a total waste of time in trying to get anywhere near the counter. I enquired of a steward if this was the only outlet, and with this being a brand new stadium it was a disgrace. The steward to her credit was in total agreement with me.

Seating in ground is good, large padded seats, with the view being as good as it gets from a corner lower tier position. Arsenal crowd were pretty quite up until point of their 2nd goal, think they realised that we would not score any more goals as that’s been our problem all season.

Overall impression of Emirates – Looks good from outside and pitch side. Suggest any away fans don’t rely on getting a refreshment from inside the stadium. Also, arrive early to get what car parking spaces you can.