Real Madrid

It had all the makings of being one of the most memorable nights of my stay here in Spain: my first Real Madrid game. Barcelona had just tied the night before and with a win Real would be tied for first place in La Liga (albeit very early in the year). Seven o'clock start time for the game so I met Jacobo Silva (my ticket connection) at Estadio Santiago Bernabeu at 6:45, enough time to find our seats and talk about the game before. When i got there i found Jaco right away and we got to our seats really quickly. Excellent seats, thirteen rows up, just about on mid-field. The stadium is awesome, overwhelming even. It holds 80,000 and it was fully sold out last week even though the Madrilistas were playing lowly Celta Vigo. The pregame chatter had been interesting because the media was reporting that Ronaldo and David Beckham were tired of not playing enough minutes and they thought the coach didnt like them. Ronaldo got to start the game which got everyone pumped, even though he is still obviously fat and lazy. Real gets some early chances and is playing a little impatiently through the first 25 minutes. There is a sense in the crowd though that Real will turn it on when it counts and get at least one goal before half-time. Then tragedy strikes, when midfielder Emerson tries a fancy move on the defensive end and gets striped of the ball and the sequence leads to a goal. The place was dead. Shocked, but not depressed. This team had won in the Bernabeu last year and it wasnt going to happen again was the attitude. So Emerson is getting horrendously booed every time he looks at the ball (which i thought was fine because the goal was all his fault) and Real is still playing impatient and not getting anything going. Then they lock in right before half and after a sequence of attacks and corner kicks, what do you know but Emerson heads one home and the place goes wild. Next time he touches the ball he practically gets a standing ovation (which i thought was ridiculous because he did nothing to set the play up, only got his head on it in a wide open lane). Halftime 1-1, no sweat, second half will be all Madrid. Wrong, Real comes out and the game flows much like the first half, attacks from both sides. Ronaldo goes out, Van Nistelrooy, Beckham and Reyes come in. This is our star lineup (but not the coaches favorite). We get some nice build-ups then nothing comes of it. Its getting late in the game and literally the exact instant when Reyes steals the ball from a Vigo player and decides to make a decisive counter attack he gets picked and the guy sets up a perfect ball to his teammate in the box who buries it for the game winner. 81st minute 2-1 Celta Vigo, the people are so pissed. Not even shocked, just pissed. Everytime a Real Madrid player touches the ball they are booing and hissing. It was super disappointing. Even more disappointing is that i probably wont get invited back for a game after being a bad luck charm tonight. It was an unbelievable experience but Real made two big mistakes and got burned. The last thing i want is to get caught up being a fan of another heartbreaking team, but i think i am already hooked.