Last night my dad, my brother and I took a trip to the City Of Manchester City Stadium for my first ever live Europa League game; Manchester City vs. Juventus.
My season ticket seats had already been taken, meaning we got another different seat for the game. Normally this would annoy me but actually the seats we ended up with were great, so I had nothing to complain about.
The Juventus fans were extremely loud and managed a reasonably good turn out – I was fairly impressed given they’d managed to bring about as many people as Blackburn did a fortnight ago, despite coming all the way from Italy.
The game was tight and tense, but we were treated to some exquisite passing from the Italians, who went 1-0 up through a long range effort that Joe Hart probably would have expected to do better with. After a myriad of chances for City (including Tevez missing his second open goal of the season), we finally equalised through an Adam Johnson goal, after he was put through brilliantly by the ever improving Viera. I genuinely feel we deserved to win this game, but a draw against former Champions League winners is nothing to be ashamed of.
The Spanish referee is also worth a mention, as he was excellent. He pretty much got all the decisions spot on (in my opinion) and did his best to let the game flow by playing the advantage numerous times. I also saw my first live game with the additional officials behind the goal, although I can’t really comment on their usefulness because they didn’t make or influence a single decision.