21 June - Joburg Ellis Park - Spain vs Honduras

WHERE HAVE ALL THE FANS COME FROM ?

ENJOY TODAY'S SLIDESHOW



Spent Sunday night at a friendly and characterful B&B called Kiara's Guesthouse, run by the very friendly Lulu. Woke up Monday mornning to be informed by Lulu that she had seen us on TV the night before. This was a short insert that SuperSport did on our roadtrip (will post the clip when we get hold of a copy). Lulu's granddaughter, Kiara, had called her and said "look Ouma, the uncle in room 5 is on tv." We felt like celebrities for a couple of hours as a few people in Nelspruit approached us and asked if we were the guys they saw on tv.

Arrived in Joburg about 3 having mistakenly detoured via Pretoria (!). The World Cup buzz is palpable in Joburg. What really struck us is the number of foreign fans walking the streets and shopping centres. I mean genuine foreign fans, not 2nd generation South African immigrants sporting the colours of their grandparents' countries. The streets of Joburg are full of the real thing.... visiting fans speaking Portuguese, Italian, Spanish and American. It's as if most fans waited for the 2nd and 3rd group games to come out. We're starting to see large groups of foreign fans in the stadiums now. New Zealand had a surprisingly large contingent in Nelspruit on Sunday while Ellis Park last night resembled Little Madrid.

Being in Gauteng really brings home the sheer scale of the World Cup.Hosting just one international match with a 60 000 attendance and a few hundred million watching on TV is a major undertaking but doing it every day (sometimes twice a day) requires enormous resources and coordination by the Gauteng authorities. Make no mistake, if you can successfully host a World Cup, then, as a country, you are a force to be reckoned with.

As for last night's game, Spain finally woke up and , having scored 2 brilliant goals, promptly went back to sleep. The Rojos still have their work cut out to make the last 16. Friday night's game against Chile is going to be massive. Spain must win to advance and, if they do, Chile faces the very real prospect of being eliminated despite winning their first two matches. And we thought Bafana were hard done by being eliminated with 4 points.

NOTE: I am desperately looking for 1 extra ticket to the Spain vs Chile match in Pretoria this Friday night.I am willing to part-trade 2 Quarter Final tickets for Soccer City on 2nd July.


Of the 10 stadiums being used for the World Cup 5 are brand new and 5 have been reffurbished.Leaving Ellis Park last night I was reminded of Barack Obama's quote about Sarah Palin: " A pig with lipstick is still a pig." Ellis Park is no pig...but it is an old stadium, despite the cpsmetic uplift. Access is difficult, the concourse is cramped and the seats are on top of each other. It's like stepping back in time after our wonderful experiences at the brand new stadiums. It makes me realise just how much South Africa has already achieved.