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Olympiakos Piraeus vs. Panathinaikos
Athens, Greece
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Rivals, The Offbeat Guide To The 92 League Clubs, is one of the best derby books available.
Read the review |
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| Borussia Dortmund - Schalke 04 (3-3) |
| Bundesliga, 13 September 2008 |
| Stadium : Signal Iduna Park (Westfalenstadion) |
| Attendance : 80.552 |
Was this the mother of all derby matches? Maybe, maybe not. At least it had all the right ingredients. A sold out (80.000) stadium, over 10.000 away fans, 2 red cards, 6 goals ...
We parked our car on a big mixed parking lot close to the stadium (costs 4 euro). We saw blue shirts stepping out of a car. And than we saw yellow shirts stepping out from the same car!
We saw yellow and blue shirts everywhere when we walked to the stadium. It seemed all very friendly but there also was some singing from little blue groups to little yellow groups and vice versa.
The larger Schalke fangroups where escorted by heavy armed police. Overall it wasn't a violent atmosphere at all. Maybe just a bit hostile.
We entered the stadium about 1,5 hours before the match. The famous sudtribune was already pretty crowded. The other stands were still empty.
The atmosphere really started 5 min. before kickoff when the player names were announced by the Dortmund speaker. The Schalke fans were in very loud voice singing "Scheiss BVB" (shit) and every Dortmund player name was accompanied by a very loud "Arschlog!" (asshole) from the Schalke fans.
The match itself was spectacular. Schalke had a 0-2 lead at half-time and scored 0-3 after about 60 minutes. I expected some more Schalke goals but out of nowhere Dortmund scored 1-3. A few minutes later it was Alexander Frei who scored a very nice 2-3.
The stadium exploded and this was just the beginning. Within 5 minutes Schalke received two red cards. They had to play almost 20 minutes with 9 players. It seemed an impossible task.
With few minutes to play it was still 2-3 with heavy pressure from Dortmund on the Schalke goal. Than in the last minute of the games, the referee handed a penalty to Borussia. Frei stepped up, and made it 3-3. The announcement of the goalscorers name was the loudest I've ever heared. 70.000 people were screaming the name of Alexander Frei.
The tension was now immense and I expected about 5 minutes extra time. Would Borussia make it 4-3?
After another incident on the pitch, the referee decided to blow the whistle. He stopped the match without extra time. A pretty weird decision but the match was so heated up that it probably was a good decision to stop it a bit early.
What an amazing match and what an amazing atmosphere. Whole stands where jumping and singing like I've never seen before. My ears where still sore an hour after the match ended. So much noise!
Outside the stadium the fans were mixed again. I saw a lot of blue and a lot of yellow and they all seemed to get along fine. Even after such an elevating match.
So much hate and tension in the stadium and such a friendly atmosphere outside the stadium.
It was an amazing experience!
This really could have been the mother of all derby matches...
Report added : 14 September 2008
Report by : Jordy
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