Hello everyone!
The Czech Republic, though small in size and population, is
a global powerhouse when it comes to sporting achievement. Since independence
they have certainly punched above their relative weight; from reaching the Euro
’96 final to producing world-class athletes such as Emil Zatopek and Roman Sebrle, they have certainly announced themselves on the
sporting stage.
Though the national football team is currently experiencing
a turbulent period – losing at home to Armenia is the currently nadir they are
trying to clamber up from – the country is represented in the Champions League
by Viktoria Plzen, who have given a good account of themselves in recent
matches with continental powerhouses such as Bayern Munich and Manchester City.
All of their European matches are on domestic television, allowing the whole
country to get behind them, whether from Plzen or Prague.
Arguably their greatest successes have come on tennis
courts, with Grand Slam winners such as Jana Novotna and Petra Kvitova
complementing their continued presence at the top table of the national team
tournaments, the Davis and Federation Cups respectively. This very weekend the
men’s national team went into the Belgrade bearpit and beat the world number
one’s country on his own patch, thus retaining the Davis Cup. A joyous moment
for the country to unite behind.
Tennis should enjoy this moment in the limelight, because it
won’t be seen on any back pages for the foreseeable future. Nor will Plzen’s
assault on the Champions League. This is because one sport, ice hockey,
dominates during the dark days of winter.
In addition to competing in the Kontinental Hockey League
alongside such luminaries as the Moscow teams (as well as the also-rans of
Astana), the country possesses a strong domestic league. As one would expect
with one city topping the charts for area, population and money, Prague boasts
numerous hockey teams within the fourteen-team league. The major two are Slavia
and Sparta and, with many teams who share a fanbase within a large city, they
abhor and despise one another.
It was thus incredible fortune that we came across an
internet advert on the Saturday night before the next set of fixtures, which
highlighted that these two giants of the ice were going to clash the following
day, and that tickets were available for a mere 149Kc (or £5). There weren’t
many left, so we snapped up the tickets in a lower corner of the Tipsport Arena
and slept soundly, dreaming of flying pucks and flurries of fists.
Derby day came, so we took a tram across to Prague 7, where
we were met by throngs of maroon shirts, signifying a mass of home support for
Sparta. The hosts were top of the table heading into battle with their local
rivals, who were languishing in eighth place. Remarkably, it seemed that most
people were outside even with the game soon to start. It transpired that you
weren’t supposed to smoke inside the stadium, so everyone was fighting the
chilling breeze to fill their lungs before clearing them by shouting at the
poor Slavia supporters.
Shouting loudly. A cacophony of noise erupted around the
stadium when Sparta took to the ice through a hilarious blow-up helmet from the
film 300. Not that we were cheering
with them. You see, the Czech small print, if I’d bothered to read it, would
have told us that our tickets granted us access to a small terrace…filled with
the bright red of a minority of Slavia fans.
Not that this minority were quiet or intimidated by the home
support. Far from it; at times it seemed that the away fans, led by a mad man
wielding a megaphone, were winning the battle of the stands, even though the
battle on the ice had taken a bad turn with an early Sparta strike. The men
with megaphones at the front, who took turns to save their voices, were
mesmeric: their command of the obediently crowd frighteningly tyrannical. From
whipping off their T-shirts in such close proximity to ice, through leading
chants with their mouths and flailing arms, to the steely stare at people who
weren’t joining in with their hearts as well as their mouths (I will
unashamedly admit I was able to hide behind taller men in front of me to avoid
this death stare), these men possessed an enormous power over their subjects.
They weren’t even watching the game.
Though they lost the match, I shall continue to support
Slavia, mainly because it turns out that all of my children support Sparta but
also because of the ferocious support of the travelling fans in the Tipsport
Arena. The Czech Republic boasts brilliant and passionate sports fans, and
successes on the clay of a tennis court or the ice of a hockey arena are the
least they deserve for their loud devotion.
Love you all
Matt
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