Wednesday, August 31, 2005
...The Beautiful Game...
We went to see a game of footie in Rio, it´s so big over here like rugby in New Zealand - everyone is into it. Maracana stadium was closed for refurbishment so we went to Luso-Brasileiro stadium (a long way out from the city). The stadium was basically an enormous scaffold structure but all the seats were good. The local side was Flamengo and they were playing Figueirense. One of the opposition team had apparently killed 2 girls in a drink-driving incident so there was lots of chanting `murderer´etc. The fans really go crazy...drums, enormous flags, chants and stamping feet. The atmposhere was electric.
Flamengo went good in the first half leading 2-0 (lots of happy chanting etc). Just like the NAB touch team they threw it all away and Figueirense scored 3 in the second half (not so happy terraces). I can´t imagine there are many 0-0 draws in Brazil - the style of football is so attacking and makes for good watching.# posted by Pete @ 5:53 PM 
