Borussia Mönchengladbach 1-0 SpVgg Greuther Fürth, Saturday 6th April 2013

Borussia Mönchengladbach 1-0 SpVgg Greuther Fürth, (Bundesliga)

Fearful of a sellout, we got there early. Too early. The stadium wasn’t actually open and the only people sharing the bus from the railway station (#17, stand 4) turned out to be stadium stewards, resplendent in their club jackets. Doh. Thankfully, there was much to be admired around Borussia Park, such as…an enormous club shop, a branch of Aldi and some other supermarket or other. That was it. This place is in the middle of nowhere, miles from the centre of town and anything approaching a bar. Still, there was a café in the supermarket, and thank god there was too, since it was bloody freezing outside.

Talk about getting in early...

Still, it wasn’t all bad news. Despite the ticket booths not being open 4 hours before KO, it turned out one could buy tickets in the club shop. 2 tickets for the seats, please. (I was treating Sarah). Sorry, only standing left. Excellent! At least I tried, and I now only had to part with €29 (€14.50 each). This was the opposite of Hannover, where previously the (cheap) standing was sold out but seats were-a-plenty.

There was a reason no-one stood here

So it was then, 50 odd thousand packed Borussia Park for the visit of rock bottom Greuther Fürth (and they didn’t bring a lot). We stood at the top of the terrace (Nord Kurve?), not wanting too many flags interrupting our view of the pitch. Initially, we’d stood above a gangway. Perfect – what a view! But I should have known there was a rabbit off when no-one else had got there first. Sure enough, 5 mins later a man and a (big) drum hung his instrument (ooh-err missus) over its balcony. Time to move.

Fabulous stadium (though I’m not too keen on the ‘spiders’ legs’ decorating the outside). The Nord Kurve, a huge terrace behind the goal, with seats above, while in the far (SE) corner, another chunk of terracing was cut out of the seating for the away fans, with their seats next to them. While a few hundred Fürth fans gathered on the terrace, you’d be lucky if two dozen took up the seats. So there WERE seats to be had!

Borussia Park, home of Borussia.

Another disease picked up from the World Cup...

The teams come out

Borussia also had not one cheerleader willing the fans on, but two. And as I settled into the error-strewn nature of this game, I got to wondering: are there awards in the Bundesliga for bestest / keenest / loudest cheerleader? Cos these two weren’t as good as I’ve previously witnessed. Half the time, it looked an afterthought as to what they were there for. And when they did start something off, they quickly stopped to turn around and see the action, hoping the fans would continue. On the whole, they didn’t. The Nord Kurve wasn’t the liveliest home end I’ve ever seen in Germany, despite the numbers. Maybe most of them were yearning for a seat???

Gotta stay warm

A female ultra

A male ultra

As I said, the match was poor. It looked like nothing-to-play-for versus going-down. Yet Borussia were chasing a Europa League place. (Perhaps, like in England, it’s seen as some kind of poisoned chalice?) Fürth broke again and again but had no pace up front, while both sides tried to outdo each other in poor passing. In the end, an awful game was decided in a few second half minutes. Fürth had a man sent off (two yellows, two poor tackles) and Borussia scored on a counter. Another poor pass was so poor it missed the intended recipient and tempted the Fürth keeper into a kamikaze run out of goal. The left winger, beating him to it, simply knocked the ball inside for De Jong to sidefoot into an empty net. The kind of goal your nan could have scored.

Prowling the touchline

I'm liking the branded goal nets

Half time.  Yes, that is a horse (foal) in goal.

Still, 10-man Fürth countered several times and were well worth a draw were they not quite so bad. This left them something like 15 points off safety with 6 games left. It showed. After the match, something resembling the horrific queue at West Ham’s tube station awaited us, as thousands of fans waited for buses to the city centre. Being Germany, there was a subtle difference: bus upon bus arrived and we can’t have been waiting for longer than 20 minutes. There’s a lot to be said for this ‘efficiency’ malarkey. (Can someone also tell Southern Trains that Brighton’s home games finish about 5pm and to have a few carriages on, pls?) At Mönchengladbach station, Sarah noticed a couple of ‘football specials’, taking fans to Düsseldorf and Duisburg. THAT, dear boy, is service.

Attendance: 50,206