There's No Place Like Home

Phill Chadwick headed to the big smoke to see Bling FC, but the Adelaide boy found Sydney a bit too much.

I had a rare chance to see an A-League game as a neutral observer the other week, at Bling Central aka Aussie Stadium when Sydney entertained Newcastle in round 10.

I will leave the reporting on the game to others, eminently more qualified than me, other than to say that I was reasonably happy with the quality of the play, as well as the result. A 1-all draw was good for Adelaide United, although a loss to Sydney would have been better.

This was the first time I have been able to see "All-Night" Dwight in the flesh. I have to say that I thought his performance a bit uneven, with some flashes of skill, a mediocre work rate and a lot of attention from defenders. For that matter, Ned Zelic should lift his work rate if he wants Aussie Guus to call him up.

Given the cruisey way he played, I wouldn't think the new Australian national gaffer would be too keen to give him his much-reported automatic place in the Australian team starting line-up. All in all, give me a team of honest grafters over a couple of mega-stars any day.

Getting to the ground from the north of Sydney would have been a lot easier if I had made some enquiries first. "Aussie Stadium" might have been just an informal name for Stadium Australia, and I made my way to Homebush. Oops!

Luckily, I had given myself plenty of time when I discovered that Aussie was in fact the new name of the Sydney Football Stadium. Of course, I knew where that one was and, apart from an unintended detour into deepest Balmain, caused by getting in the wrong lane somewhere along Parramatta Road, I made it to Moore Park and into the car park.

I wish they wouldn't keep changing the names of the Stadiums.

"Car park" is a rather charitable description of the cow paddock opposite the stadium, entrance to which cost me a whopping $18. I should have expected it, I suppose, but a humble Adelaide boy can never be fully prepared for Sydney car parking charges.

By now it was raining heavily. Thankfully, civilisation in Sydney has developed to the point where umbrellas can safely be taken into the Stadium. Adelaide is, as we all know, so barbaric that merely holding an umbrella in your hand creates an irresistible temptation to do injury to all those around you.

So, alas, umbrellas are still banned from Hindmarsh. Oh that we could be trusted with an umbrella on a rainy night. In Sydney you are trusted, so I strolled in, brolly deployed jauntily, just as the Newcastle players emerged from their bus.

There was Nick Carle right in front of me, well within umbrella striking range. Momentarily distracted by his mobile phone, he was a sitting duck for my brolly weapon. However, in keeping with the civilising influence of the Sydney city skyline in the background, I bravely managed to resist the urge to nobble Carle with a well placed thrust of the sharp end.

My path into the ground was then blocked by wave after wave of raffle ticket sellers, all eager to allow me to financially support Sydney FC. After a couple of polite "No, thank you's", I hit upon the desperate strategy of closely following a young couple who were brandishing their recently bought raffle tickets in a, generally successful, effort to fend off the vultures. This scheme worked until I got somewhere near my allocated seat, where my cover veered off and I was defenceless again. At least I had my brolly.

Not knowing the ground seating arrangements, I had asked the ticket seller for his advice. I ended up with a "Silver" ticket, in a "pretty good spot". Well, my definition of pretty good and his do not coincide. My seat was in the top corner of the middle tier, tucked away in the back row.

The length of the playing arena, presumably designed for Rugby League, means that the goal lines for football are well inside the fences at the ends. As a result, my pretty good seat (which cost a Sydney-like $23) was well behind the goal line, miles away from the pitch and tucked up under the upper tier seating.

The fact that a disappointing crowd of only 9,000-odd had braved the rain meant that I was free to migrate to a better seat near the half-way line, but still under the shelter of the upper tier. I think most of those sitting around me had shelled out for Gold tickets.

With half an hour to kick-off, I did a slow lap of the ground, checking the various areas and sniffing out mood of the crowd. I decided that I liked the stadium, even though it is clearly too big for current crowd numbers. I would have liked to see that stadium with 30,000 people inside.

It was quite sad to see that small crowd huddled together in any sheltered area they could find. How different to Hindmarsh, where we all get wet together when it rains. You don't have much choice, except for the lucky ones in the top deck of the Grandstand.

That being said, I have to say that the curved roof all the way around Aussie Stadium does its rain-protecting job fairly well, at least in the upper seats. Its other job is, of course, to create a sound shell effect, amplifying the crowd noise. And The Cove supporters group did a fine job, ably assisted by the roof, in creating a good football atmosphere.

I couldn't help wondering how loud the Adelaide United supporters group, The Gate, would be if they had the membership numbers of The Cove and a roof structure to funnel the sound!

The presence of a replay screen and a fully-functioning scoreboard are a pleasant change from the disgraceful situation at Hindmarsh. These are features that should be standard in this competition. How and why the fantastic Hindmarsh Stadium has neither a big screen, nor a scoreboard with all the globes working is beyond me. And this continues to be an embarrassment.

The game was about to start.

And this leaves me with one more whinge, which seems to be a constant cause of annoyance, to me at least. The game was advertised for a 5pm kick-off. Now, when I played the game, the Referee had a duty to ensure that the game began at the scheduled time. Any delays were severely punished.

Now 5:00pm is the scheduled kick off.

At 5:03pm the players are just walking out for the mandatory line-up.

It takes until 5:05pm for the actual kick-off.

This sort of thing also happens in Adelaide at every game that I have seen. And I suppose it is common these days throughout the league.

Just what is going on here? Is the official kick-off time really 5:05 and the A-League are treating us as idiots by trying to get us there early? Is the score board time display 5 minutes fast? Does Mark Shield, Australia's best referee, need to buy a new watch?

I don't like it and I don't understand it. Or maybe the rules have changed and I didn't notice.

With the game finally underway, I again had to question the A-League's silly policy of white away strips. Since when does gold clash with pale blue? The meagre contingent of Newcastle travelling fans, a pretty poor showing considering the proximity of the two cities, all wore the gold home strip shirt.

So if this is a ploy to get them to buy both tops, it is not working. Come on A-League, let's just have the white when the real colours clash.

And by the way, talking of away strips, has anyone else noticed that the Newcastle away tops, with the flesh-toned "gold" section on the shoulders look at first glance like a sexy, bare shoulder evening outfit, or is that just me?

Anyway, I had a good day at the football. I liked the Aussie Stadium and I would love to have seen it full and loud. But after all, I am an Adelaide boy, and I wished I could have just clicked my heels together, like Dorothy, say "There's No Place Like Home" and be back at Hindmarsh Stadium.

For all its faults, still my favourite place to watch the football.

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