I perhaps looked at last night from a different perspective from most blues who were in the ground sat, as I was, among the united fans, next to my dad on his season ticket.
I know it's many supporters idea of hell, being in the opposition end, especially in a Derby, but I quite enjoy it. You've got to concentrate a great deal more, not only on the game, but also on not revealing yourself. Try not to smile at the songs coming from the City end too much ( I caught myself tapping my feet on more than one occasion to the Lamborghini song!), try and stay impassive when we score or when a City player gets fouled.
What being in that setting also does, however, is make you reflect a little more on matters, than if you're in the City end when you're getting swept along with all the collective energy and positivity of those around you.
Like others, I found the first quarter of an hour to be exilerating, intoxicating almost. The power and precision of our play was a thing of beauty. We never quite reached those heights in the rest of the course of the game, but I remember sometime in the second half, when we were two goals up and there was a passage of play which involved Silva and Yaya which united, once again, were completely unable to cope with, in terms of brain or brawn.
I remember reflecting on that move, looking at the united players completely incapable of dealing with it, looking at the City fans to my left, then at the look of punch-drunk disbelief of those sat around me and for a moment I thought back to all those Derbies in the 80's and 90's when we were completely overcome by a never-ending red tide and I reflected for a second on all the delight that those sat around me used to derive from mocking my football club and I thought to myself: it really doesn't get any better than this.
