Derby Day

Sunday saw the biggest game of the football calendar take place as it was the day of the Seville derby. This derby is seen as one of the strongest rivalries between two Spanish teams (Sevilla and Betis), if not the greatest, and it was easy to see why. The game didn’t kick off until 9 o’clock in the evening, yet much earlier than that is when the party started and I think party is a good word to describe the atmosphere.

Betis fans gather at their stadium from around 5 o’clock where they go through their pre-match celebrations before they are escorted through the streets of Seville by police to Sevilla’s stadium, the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan. For such a big game their was understandably a very large police presence, but I was surprised about how many police were actually there. To escort the Betis fans across the city it took around 6 police vans, 5 horses and a load of officers on foot. I saw the Betis’ players coach drive past at one point which was being given an escort by 5 police cars and 5 police bikes. All that just for one coach. Then around the stadium there was a police car parked on every street corner before and after the game as well as many horses and policemen on foot. It was clear that security was a priority and considering how much the two sets of fans hated each other no chances were going to be taken. Every song the fans sang about the other team seemed to contain at least one swear word and some even wished death upon their rivals.

Sevilla fans are very passionate people and before the game this was evident. The streets near the ground were packed full of supporters singing, letting off flares, fireworks and drinking. And boy did they drink. In England games on this scale are scheduled for as early in the day as possible to give supporters as little drinking time as possible to avoid violence. With this game not starting until late in the evening it gave fans as much time as they wanted. The practice seemed to be to head out in the afternoon to get your spot with your drink and stay there until it was time to go in the ground. They weren’t just having a few beers either, groups of men were stood around benches with whole bottles of spirits and mixer and one guy even had ice in his cup! An example of how it should be done.

Sevilla banner in the home end

The game itself was a good one and didn’t fail to meet expectations. It ended 4-0 to Sevilla and the gulf in class was evident although a sending off at 1-0 for a Betis player just before half-time probably didn’t help their cause. Tackles were flying from the first minute and it seemed Betis were resorting to foul play to try and stop their opponents but it didn’t work. I recorded a series of videos which I will post below so you can see what the atmosphere was like if you wish.

On another note, over the past week I have been busy doing work on my project but I did finally manage to get one important job done and have a haircut! One has been needed for a few weeks but I was a little anxious about going with fear of something going wrong or being lost in translation. In the end though it went surprising well and the bloke did a pretty good job, I even learnt some new words such as ‘las patillas’ which are your sideburns and ‘el flequillo’ which is your fringe and I can use those next time.

The haircut was a success!