I arrived back to the hostel after a day in Naples, walked in to the kitchen to fill my water bottle, and one of the chicks staying there was having a conversation with a guy that works there. Then she turned to me and said ‘wanna go to the football’. I believe my answer was ‘FUCK YEAH’. Not just because she’s from Brazil and looks like your typical Brazilian (hot as), but because one of the things I wanted to do whilst in Europe was to try and see a few football (soccer) matches. The match was a UEFA Champions League match between Napoli and Utretch in the Netherlands. I knew both teams were pretty average but its more about experiencing the atmosphere and not the actual football, plus tickets are only 21 euros.

Miss Brazil, another girl from England and I got on the metro and headed to the stadium. Quite handy because the Brazilian chick can speak a bit of Italian so directions were left up to her. Some young locals on the train told us to get off when the train stopped at one of the stations as thats where the stadium was . But we were quickly stopped by another older and nicer local who was quick to say they are being idiots and are deliberately telling you the wrong station. So we got off at the next stop, the correct one, and made our way around to the entrance for our area of seating. Ive never seen so much chaos in my life, people pushing and shoving in the line to get in, even though the match wasn’t even starting for another hour.

The area of our seating was behind the goal and quite high up. Theres no seat numbers or anything organised like that (shock horror) so you just find seats wherever and they’re yours. This cheap section is where all the local die hard fans sit. I don’t know why they even bother with seats as we spent the entire 90 minutes standing on them watching the game. The crowd around us was great to be a part of though, shouting and chants and whistling the entire time. I can understand why the two chicks wanted a guy to go with them though, the entire time there they were being ogled and chatted up by typical sleazy Italian guys. The only Italian chicks that were there seemed to be the girlfriends of guys there. The match ended up being 0-0 but it was pretty exciting the entire time, and it was great to finally see what a European football crowd is really like. I might even be able to see the other match when they play each other again in Utretch in December which would be cool.

After the match we went to the university district area piazza whatever you want to call it to sink a few beers. Pretty much all the locals just come to this piazza and drink and socialise, public drinking being legal and all. Theres no pubs or clubs around, just pizzerias to get some food and buy your beers which are super cheap. Overall the whole night was great, went from spending it at the hostel watching a movie to seeing a football match and having a few beers with good company.