We attended our first Barça game last night, and it was even better than expected. Camp Nou (Barça stadium) is not too far from our home, a short walk and tram (streetcar) ride, about 20 minutes in total, and we could walk the whole way in 30 minutes. Sevilla was in town for a La Liga game; this is Round 4 of 38 rounds in the season (40 teams, 2 games against all 19 opponents), ending in May 2014.
The atmosphere was vibrant, with 77,000 in the stadium, which actually has a capacity of 100,000. We had purchased tickets on the club website in the afternoon, and it is quite an investment for a family of five, close to $100 for any decent seat.
As with many U.S. sporting events, backpacks were allowed but searched, with the tops of our water bottles taken by security. For a stadium this size, food offerings seemed very limited and no alcohol is served. It is really all about the game. With chips and other snacks, you are given small trash bags, so we were careful not to leave a mess on the ground, a difficult task with sunflower seeds and peanuts; still, fans seem to observe this rule of litter.
While cheering could be loud at times, it was for the most part polite applause after a good stop on defense and accelerating noise when Barça’s offense was approaching the Sevilla goal. Even so, it was nothing like a U.S. football game or a U.K. premier league match (from what I am told), in terms of sheer volume, chaos, and we did not see a fight. And you cannot help but enjoy “El Cant del Barça”, the team song, played at the beginning and end of the game.
As for scoring, Dani Alves struck first and then Neymar set up a Messi goal, to put Barça up 2-0 after 74 minutes, what seemed to be a certain win. But then Sevilla scored two minutes later and again in the last minute to tie the game and completely quiet the stadium. Three minutes of injury time commenced and just when you thought the final result would be a tie, Messi did some creative dribbling to the side of the Sevilla goal near the line and fired back to Alexis who scored, with the game ending less than a minute later. Messi was certainly impressive, as expected, but my novice spectating ability tells me Neymar stood out just as much, with his ball handling, speed and passing skills.
