Matt's World Cup Diary

Day 5 – Mexico v Portugal - Gelsenkirchen

This was a strange day.

Off to Gelsenkirchen for the Mexico / Portugal game, thought this might be an easy one to get some extra tickets for, how wrong I was. There were a ridiculous amount of Mexican’s around, which pushed the market price above that of the England game the previous day – 500 Euros at KO. Headed back towards the fan park, which was Schalke’s old stadium on the edge of town. Journey enlivened by being crushed against a bunch of Mexican schoolgirls on the tram. Although we were squashed together so tightly I was probably committing many potentially illegal acts, they were too drunk to care.

At the fan park find another 30,000 Mexican fans to add to the 40,000 at the stadium, get showered in liquid everytime there is an incident in the game – just hope it was beer. Difficult to believe the Mexicans have all crossed the Atlantic so can only assume every Mexican restaurant in Europe is shut. The last few days have certainly given lie to the notion that only England fans travel in huge numbers – just as many Mexicans and Swiss around.

We end up watching the first half of the Holland v Argentina game in a Dutch bar and the 2nd half in an Argentinian restaurant. Initially the chef replete in replica kit refuses to cook until the game is over, but seems happy with the result and proceeds to explain how the Argentinian team were in the previous week. When we express scepticism he shows us the signed menu and newspaper article to prove it, he then goes on to give us free wine and starts dancing with all the customers – male and female. Despite being a big lad he’s a nifty mover and whilst I hide in the corner, he proceeds to pick Andy up mid-samba and flip him over his head, to Andy’s astonishment. By the end of the night he’s asking us to sign the same menu as the Argentinian team which may have reduced it’s E-Bay value somewhat. Food was nice as well.

A very strange day.

Andy the right way up