I didn't get a ticket to enter the stadium to watch the Champions League final, but that shouldn't stop me from making a trip down to London to soak up the atmosphere in the first place. There is never a better coincidence than me being in England and the Champions League final being held in London at the same time. I don't think I'll ever live to see another coincidence like that. Since I was occupied with exams earlier, I didn’t book any early train tickets to London. Apparently the rail authorities knew that there is gonna be a Champions League final and even though I attempted to book it one week earlier, the prices are still exorbitant at around £25. With that amount, I could easily fly to Europe! Where were the £6.50 tickets that Leo had booked earlier? Arghhh..the best I could do to save cost was to get the earliest bus at £17 and then a return train ticket at 10pm at £13. If I had booked the coach earlier, it would have just been £6.50. The whole planning of transportation this time made me realise that Brits always plan their journeys in advanced – by weeks so as to save cost.
Anyways, the bus was scheduled to leave at 5.40am and I didn’t really sleep much for fear that I may get stuck in a deep slumber. I decided to make a move earlier also because I needed to get the train tickets from the Leeds rail station. Once I’ve gotten there, I went as usual to the machine to get the tickets but to my horror, the machine started demanding a reference number which I’ve never encountered before. It seems that such occurences exist if I had booked more than 1 destination. Argghh..it was a moment of panic because in 15 minutes time, the bus is leaving. The ticket office can’t do anything without the reference number and my only saving grace was the phone internet that I have which I can use to log onto Gmail to retrieve the reference. But logging on also need time, and I don’t have that. I started to smack myself at that time because I could have picked the collection point at King’s Cross Station. It was pointed out that we are not allowed to pick another collection point other than the one selected online. This would ultimately mean that my return tickets are nullified and I may have to purchase new ones. Greatttt…more money is gonna get wasted, and not only mine but also JP’s. In the end, I resolved to run off catch the bus instead and chose to bank on a slim hope that I may still be able to retrieve the tickets from KC station. I calculated that it makes no sense if one is not able to collect from the station one is leaving eventhough a different collection point is selected.
I slept for the whole bus journey and the 4hrs just went away. When I woke up, I found myself in London. I quickly made my way to the Victoria Tube station as the first priority now is to get to KC station to resolve the ticket issue. We need a way back home! Inside the Victoria tube station, there were Barca fans everywhere. It was as if the whole place just turned into a Catalan Metro. Once I’ve reached KC station, I went to the machine and punched in the reference number ( I managed to went online in the bus). And to my relief, the machine printed out the tickets! WHEW! Thank God! It was fortunate that we kept calm and did not rush to buy another bus ticket to return. With that issue firmly solved, we could now properly direct our attention to enjoy the Champions League final atmosphere in the English capital.
First up, we decided to go to Hyde Park to visit the free Champions League Festival exhibition there. Today is the last day it is gonna be up and we thought that we should definitely get going there before it closes at 5pm. This is only the 3rd time they are holding such an exhibition and it features lots of stuff relating to the elite European football competition. The Champions League trophy will also be on display and also other museum pieces from the former players. When we reached the site, we could see that the whole area is flooded with either United or Barca fans. One of the first areas we went to explore was the ‘Champions Theatre’ where it’s something like a movie theatre which showcases prominent matches and players. Afterthat, we checked out the rest of the exhibits such as the players museum. I wanted to take a photo with the Champions League trophy but the queue is just too long. Another interesting that was going on in Hyde Park was a futsal match which was held in a “mini stadium” in the middle of the festival. It involves past stars where England XI is pitched against The rest of the World XI. Andy Cole, Sheringham, Dwight Yorke, Dennis Wise, Cafu, the de Boer twins, Darren Anderton and Jay Jay Okocha were some of the famous names that were there. The line queue to the souvenir shop was super long too but I managed to squeeze in to grab myself an official matchday scarf to commemorate the day. Once we are done exploring the festival, it was time to make our way to the venue itself – Wembley Stadium.
It wasn’t easy getting onto the trains because scores of Barca fans are being loaded inside. There were some United fans but a majority of them are Barca. I figured out that the higher amount of Barca fans in the train is due to the fact that the Spaniards are travelling from abroad while the English United fans basically just have to drive down the highway using their cars. Upon reaching the Wembley Park station, I could feel the chaotic rush surrounding the station. In the horizon as seen from the station was Wembley Stadium and the entire path leading there was just filled with tons of people. It could easily have reached more than 100k people at that place alone considering that Wembley’s capacity is at 90k. It seems that we are not the only ones without tickets who are going to linger outside the stadium just to get a feel of the atmosphere. The weather was pretty bad as it was drizzling all the way but it’s not that heavy to the extent that an umbrella was needed. I attempted to get the matchday programme on the way to the stadium but it seems that they were all sold out. I had to go right to the outside of the stadium before I spotted a booth with new batches of matchday programmes coming in. UEFA is definitely making money out of this – each programme costs £10! Ahhh, it’s an important historical document for me to archive, so I didn’t mind getting one for myself.
After feeling satisfied absorbing the atmosphere and taking some good photos in the process, we made our way back to KC station. We planned to watch it at a nearby pub near the station so that once the match ended, we can easily get onto the train since we don’t have much time between the final whistle and train departure. We didn’t really scout the place and we weren’t even sure if we could find one. Fortunately, we managed to grab a spot (one of the last areas) at a restaurant near Euston Road Premier Inn. I bought myself a pint of Pepsi and some wedges and I’m ready for the match.
To be honest, I’ve always felt United to be the underdog in this match given the composition of their squad. As such, I wasn’t surprise when Barca first took the lead through Pedro. Just like in 2009, United had started the first 10 minutes well, but somehow Barca still managed to dominate in the end. Rooney’s equaliser brought fresh hopes that United may just turn it around. But it wasn’t to be. Messi dazzled the crowd once again when he fired one from outside the box to give Barca the lead. One could said that van der Sar should have dealt with it better but I say that it’s one piece of magic from the Argentinian maestro that nobody could stop. David Villa put a definite end to any hope on United’s part to equalise when he slotted in the 3rd. Once again, United did not have enough steam to deal with the Catalan juggernaut.
The Wembley adventure did not just end there. A rude surprise awaits us at the train station when we found out that the train to Leeds is cancelled and the next train would be the next morning. A group of folks were furious as they gather around the train office. The train company offered no definite solutions, and their suggestions required us to fork out some money and they reimburse us afterthat. I know very well that red tape will mean that reimbursement will take forever. The group of us continued to pressure the office until they relented to provide us with free taxi rides home from a designated train station. All the commotion saw us reaching Leeds Rail Station only at 2am in the morning, 2hrs after the original scheduled arrival time. Ahhhh, messy..but no complaints there though given that we were reimbursed with a free ride to the station. Overall a tiring day but still a rewarding one indeed to have been there to step onto the venue of a Champions League final.
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