I had the most excellent experience on Saturday 11th August, holding the Olympic football final ticket in my hand between Brazil v Mexico at Wembley. Rather overwhelming I admit, not only was I going to the Olympics but also the sport that I love and the final at that. A crowd consisting of 86,000 was at Wembley that day to see Mexico triumph over Brazil 2-1 and the atmosphere was terrific to say the least.
The main factor from the experience of the game and the build-up was how impressive the crowd was. As it’s been stated before many times is incredibly friendly, everyone wants a good time. Mexican and Brazilian football can often be rather volatile, a lot of crowd trouble and to my understanding a youth team coach for the Mexican club Indios was shot dead recently. However, there were a lot of hard-core Mexican and Brazilian fans there but they were all in admirable spirits and were all kept calm.
They were even serving beer at Wembley! Which doesn’t usually happen to my recollection, in the last three England national games I have attended, the strongest and most potent drink you could purchase was a red bull. I’ve always disagreed with football stadiums that don’t serve alcohol having no beer in a football game is a crazy situation that probably makes fans more tense and angry than vice versa. Also, if you don’t allow alcohol to be served at a stadium, fans will just go out and binge drink before the game and be even worse when they get in the stadium.
Anyway, moving on to the standard witnessed this year at the Olympics, bar Team GB, who thought in some cases they would progress to the semi-final with Brazil easily; with sometimes cocky attitude everyone gave a 110% in the games, everyone wanted to do well for their country. Case in point: Mexico, who with a dogged approach and strong determination managed to conquer clear favourites Brazil in a huge upset; they grinded and defended with their hearts on their sleeves, constantly breaking down Brazils attacks and only letting them have speculative chances which weren’t taken in until a goal by Hulk in the 90th min. How about the most talked about player other than Messi and Ronaldo, Neymar?
He proved in fits and starts he has genuine world class, a runner at players like Messi with very fast feet and superb speed, however he was let down in the match with his shooting blazing wide and over the bar on many occasion, spraying and losing the ball to Mexico and being tackled a number of times. Very much 50/50 performance from Neymar, who obviously needs to grow stronger before he goes to Europe, which will happen as he has incredible talent and there is no way of getting around that.
The Brazilians and Mexico’s different styles of play proved to make a first-rate game and I left Wembley feeling content with what I just saw for a final, although I would of loved if Oscar scored his last minute chance for Brazil which he really should of done and took it to extra time but that wasn’t the case and Mexico went crazy after the final whistle blew, Gold by Spandau ballet booming out of the speakers at Wembley and the best team had won the Olympics.
The Olympics in general was probably the best two weeks of sport I’ve ever witnessed and to top it off, getting to go the final was a great pleasure and something I’ll never forget.
I can’t wait for the next Olympics in Brazil and I’m hoping Team GB will be entering it, without Stuart Pearce mind. If Olympic Football continues on this form it will soon be in the same league as with The World Cup, The Euros and Copa America in my opinion.
What did everyone think of this year’s Olympic Football?
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