I’ve been very lucky in that there weren’t many years when I
was younger that my parents didn’t take me abroad with them at least once a
year, doing the usual Spanish holiday where the major decision of the day was
Beach or pool? Followed by chicken or burger and chips?...
Nearing the end of one of these holidays in 1999 my Dad and
I decided that we wanted to do something a little different and took the plunge
and used the 7600 pesetas (that’s how long ago it was)which was about £60 if I
remember correctly, which my Grandad had given 17 year old me as “Spendo” on a
trip to see the local team Club Deportivo de Tenerife play Valencia Club de
Futbol (to give them their full proper fancy titles)....
...£60 seemed a bit expensive but you only live once so we did
it anyway, what we didn’t realise was that the extravagantly entitled “Estadio
Helidoro Rodriquez Lopez” was in the capital Santa Cruz de Tenerife, and over
an hour and a half away from Los Christianos where we were staying and that the
price included the ticket AND return coach travel. So perhaps it was actually quite cheap.
What's more is that on the bus were lots of fans of other
English clubs, my Dad and I are Wednesday fans and we had a great time on the
journey, with banter flying between us and the other Owls, the blades, Leeds
there even the Swindon Town fan got involved! It was all good natured though.
Wednesday at the time were still in the Premiership and as
such the rumour mill of who they were after was still very much in swing and
the Dutch international striker Roy Makaay was one such player and he was
playing for the home side so us Owls were excited to see him before his
impending switch to Hillsborough – a move that never happened unfortunately.
Also playing for them was Emmerson of Middlesborough fame.
This was my first ever game in a foreign land and to be
honest I was a little overwhelmed by the crowds thronging the streets and the
noise was incredible. Probably due to the close proximity of the surrounding
buildings but it just seemed that people were coming from everywhere.
Perusing the
programme without being able to read Spanish is a slight problem but you could
grasp the severity of the situation that Tenerife found themselves in…only a
win would save “Los Chicaerros” from relegation to “la Segunda” and even then
it would require other results to go their way. (It was the 13th
June and they only had this and one more game left).
They got that win, (3-2) but ….unfortunately the results
didn’t go their way and by kick off Tenerife were already down. But that didn’t
stop it being one of the best games I’d seen up to that point or since if I’m
being completely honest.
The atmosphere was highly charged as you can imagine and in
the home crowd you could sense a mixture of “we’re down but let’s at least give
it some for the last time” and “you lot are useless I’m going to let you know
that, in no uncertain terms” the latter was certainly what the right back got. A simple mistake of miss controlling the ball
out for a throwin was met with dogs abuse which lasted for most of the game, and
I’ve since come to the conclusion that maybe it was for being rubbish the whole
season rather than that minor incident.
A massive following of 12 had come from Valencia to cheer on
their team tucked up in the corner I say cheer, you couldn’t hear them and away
support is not something that you get a lot of in Spain unless theres something
to play for, as it was they were safe up in 5th place and were
probably more interested in the san miguel than the match…
It’s been a while and how the goals went in is lost to me
but there were definitely two red cards and a penalty which for some reason I
can’t remember even seeing but thanks to the magic of the internet here are the
teams…..
Tenerife CD -Unzue, Alexis, Ballesteros, Lussenhoff
(Llorente 68), Basabilvaso (Lopez 58), Dani, Emerson, Makaay, Mista, Pier
(Juanele 75) ,Pinialla
Goals – Makaay – Pier x 2
Cards – Red – Ballesteros - 87mins
Yellow
– 5 players!
Valencia CF – Canizares, Roche (Jandro71), Soria , Carboni ,
Angloma , Farinos, Milla , Mendieta (Popescu 53) ,Angulo, Claudio,Vlaovic
(Juanfran 38)
Goals – Angulo, Claudio.
Cards – Red – Soria 37mins
Yellow – 3 (including one for
Soria)
Final Score:-Tenerife CD 3 – 2 Valencia CF
I enjoyed the experience so much that on returning to the UK
I’ve been following “That team we saw on holiday” and been to a few more
matches since.
It is I believe normal to gravitate towards the home side in
these situations but as they don’t show lower league Spanish football on TV “my”
team had to be VALENCIA!!!
AMUNT!!!
