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1. Why you were looking forward to
going to the ground (or not as the case may be):
As this was a massive match for my team Oldham
Athletic, 3rd round of the magical FA Cup a
lower league team against a Premier League Team
- a possible banana skin in the making. Being an
Oldham fan based in Northern Ireland and due to
the fact that Oldham have been playing in the
lower leagues for a number of years this was my
first visit to a premier league teams ground
hence the excitement.
2. How easy was your journey/finding the
ground/car parking:
We flew into Liverpool airport from Belfast on
the morning of the game, and a friend from
Oldham drove across and met us at the airport.
We drove into the centre of Liverpool as we got
lost we stopped and asked a more than helpful
taxi driver how to get to Goodison. He must have
been from the red side of Merseyside as we
followed his directions and we ended up and
Anfield the home of Liverpool FC. We knew both
grounds are located within touching distance so
within 5 minutes we could see Goodison in the
distance. We drove past the main stand and
parked our car down a small side street we
arrived at the ground around 11.00 so there was
plenty of available spaces.
3. What you did before the game pub/chippy....
home fans friendly?
We went for our breakfast in a small cafe
located near the ground and to our surprise they
served an Ulster Fry and being from Northern
Ireland this was ideal, so the 5 of us got stuck
into that. We then headed off to the
Wetherspoons pub for a few beers, the pub was
empty when we arrived apart from a few fans
kitted out in Everton tops. We all had Oldham
Athletic tops visible in the pub but there was
no trouble at all very very friendly, until it
came to about 13.45 when the pub started to get
busy and we started to get a few dirty looks
from a number of guys. We thought this was the
right time to leave so we made our way to the
ground. In all the home fans where quite
friendly apart from the guys that tried to stare
us out at the pub, but you get these sorts of
people no matter what ground you visit.
4. What you thought on seeing the ground, first
impressions of away end then other sides of the
ground.
On approaching the ground it looked quite
impressive, it was very busy in and around the
ground, therefore we made our way to the away
end. What a disappointment the away end was, our
tickets where for the Bullens Stand (Lower Tier)
at the back. The view was dire and as it was a
5,500 sell out for the away fans there was no
spare seats to move to. We had small wooden
seats bolted to a wooden type floor and hardly
any room to manoeuvre. The rest of the ground
looked okay especially the main stand towering
over the pitch. You can know understand why
Everton are looking to move to a new ground as
parts of Goodison really are not fit for Premier
League footie.
5. Comment on the game itself, atmosphere,
stewards, pies, toilets etc..
What can I say we won 1-0 against a team riding
high in the premiership, Oldham mid table League
One Team - Everton 6th in the Premiership and
still in the later stages of the UEFA Cup.
Everton did field an under strength team,
however they still had 7 internationals on show.
Not to mention we had 6 players unavailable from
our win at Leeds a few days earlier. The
stewards our the best I have encountered on my
football travels, no hassle at all I wish a
number of other grounds I visited had the same
type of stewarding take note Nottingham Forest.
6. Comment on getting away from the ground after
the game:
We celebrated long after the game and this
allowed for the disappointed Everton fans to
disperse. On leaving the ground the police where
out in force, helicopter circling above with a
giant search light beaming down on top of us and
mounted police visible. We covered up our Oldham
colours and made our way back to the car just in
case some Everton fans took the defeat bad. On
all quite easy to get away from the ground we
reached our car and made our way back to
Liverpool Airport for our flight back to
Belfast.
7. Summary of overall thoughts of the day out:
A great day out and what made it even better was
the Everton fans at the airport shaking our
hands and saying Oldham deserved the win.
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