In my usual seat in block 305 on Sunday, there were a number of tourists around me. The bloke and his lad who usually sit to my right weren't there so there seats had been sold to a couple of young-ish Asian lads.
To my left, there was a couple of Ajax fans (bloke and his missus) and I got talking to them. They'd come over for the weekend, toured the swamp on Saturday and then decided to buy tickets for City on Sunday. I had a chat to them about all things Dutch football. They were clearly wanting City to win. They'd had a £50 bet on a Haaland hat-trick and were made up when (Dutch) Reijinders scored. I had a top laugh with them and advised them where to drink on Sunday night.
When Chelsea equalised, they were visibly gutted. I turned to my right and one of the Asian lads was filming a video much like the one above.
It occured to me walking back to the car that we need tourists to fill the stadium and will do more so when the North Stand is fully open. I have no problem with that. I've been a tourist at AC Milan, Inter Milan, Sampdoria, Hellas Verona, Borussia Dortmund, Schalke, 1.FC Koln, Borussia Monchengladbach, Eintracht Frankfurt, Dusseldorf, Bayer Leverkusen, Rangers, Hibernian, Allemenia Aachen, and Standard Liege.
What I do though is try to blend in. I'll wear a shirt, a hat, a scarf of the home team, or no colours at all in most cases. I'll desperately want them to win, I'll cheer their goals, I'll be gutted when the away team scores. I certainly won't stand filming away fans celebrating a vital late goal with a gormless smile on my face.
If the club are to continue to pump tickets out to tourists, they should at least do the decent thing and put the etiquette expected out with the ticket. We all know that they won't though because the bottom line is the most important thing to those who run our club.
