A stupid o'clock flight on Ryanair from Stansted saw us at our hotel in the centre of town for 11.30am. a quick check in later and it was time to explore Palermo and grab some lunch.
Having been to mainland Italy many times this was my (and the wife's) 1st visit to Sicily. Palermo is a very interesting city in that it has a mix of very old and very ruined buildings to the nice and new flashy buildings. The "tourist" areas are mainly bunched together and once you are there are pretty small in size and range from the wow to the why did I bother factor!
I booked the tickets for the game on line with www.listicket.it at a cost of €40.00 each (cheapest available) in the Curva Nord. The tickets had to be collected between 16.30 & 19.00 on Friday or from 9am on the day of the game.
Having checked out the stadium on google maps I knew that it was one straight bus ride of 20 minutes from near our hotel, I thought going up to the stadium for 18.30 on Friday would be a safe bet & less hassle than the day of the game....little did I know but listicket had the box office opening times wrong and should in fact been shown as 16.00 to 18.30!
A very kind chap working at the ground informed me of this fact and that if we returned in the morning obtaining the tickets would be a smooth process. After a quick look around the outside of the ground and posing under a banner advertising the match it was off back into town.
The Palermo nightlife is very good and they have this fantastic tradition where as all of the bars put out free food for their customers...so after several good quality German beers and some local and national finger food (well more like a 3 course meal) it was time to retire after a very long day ready for the match.
Up bright and early and after filling up on espresso and pastries for breakfast we were on the same bus off to the stadium again to collect tickets for the match that was kicking off at 18.30. 10 minutes after alighting from the bus we were heading back to the bus stop with the tickets safely tucked away and with me beaming like a Cheshire cat.
Several hours spent looking around the shops and various attractions that we hadn't seen the day before and another hearty lunch it was getting close to 5pm. With me not wanting to arrive at the stadium bang on kick off time we made our way back up to the stadium by bus.
The police were out in force for this spicy clash but strangely the police were not inside the stadium only outside, only stewards were inside the perimeter which I found to be quite strange.
Entering the ground was easy with stewards at each gate to help you put your ticket on the electronic scanner which turned green and let you inside the ground. With this obstacle our of the way and the match less than 15 minutes from kick off we found out stair entrance and off we went to the top tier of the Curva Nord, and wow what a site greeted me, this really is a cracking old ground even if it does only have 1 covered side.
All 4 sides of the ground are double tiered, with only the main stand having a roof as well as executive boxes. The Curva Sud is where the "normal" Palermo fans gather, with the Juve fans (around 3,000 of them) in the corner between the Curva Sud and West side. The long West Stand which runs the length of the pitch was a bit mixed with many "local" Juve fans gathered there but not making their selves heard until their team scored. The Curva Nord is the home to the Ultra's and thinking the Ultra's gather on the lower tier I ordered upper tier tickets (all the same price) only to be extremely surprised that the seats I had purchased were slap bang in the middle of the Ultra's...much to the amusement of my wife!
Deciding our purchased seats were a bit too lively we retreated 20 seats to the left along with the younger Ultra's and some families. As the game started the atmosphere intensified and became quickly apparent how much Palermo hate Juve with many songs consisting of lots of swear words and inviting the travelling fans to do various things with their own mothers!!
The 1st half was played out mainly in the Palermo half as Juve went at their hosts straight away but for a lot of midfield play chances on goal were few and far between and Juve were forced to take pot shots from outside the 18 yard box.
Half time came and with the teams locked at 0-0 there did only seem to be one winner and it wasn't going to be the home side. Several minutes of bangers and fire crackers being lit and set off right by us had us moving over to the corner for the 2nd period. Juve already buoyed by the fact that their ex player Amari had given Fiorentina a 2-1 win at the San Siro that afternoon to defeat Milan meant a win would take them to the top of the table. 11 minutes into the 2nd half and the first goal duly came, when Andre Pirlo floated a corner in for Bonucci to head home.
5 minutes after the first goal the 2nd duly arrived with Quaglirella skipping away from he's defender after a nice 1-2 firing the ball low into the corner, cue mass hysteria from the travelling fans and the game was as good as won. A couple of half chances from Miccoli and the game was over. The home fans left very upset especially as there were quite a few Juve fans in the 2 stands along the side of the pitch and no-one was doing anything about it....lots of gesturing but no action.
We left the stadium and made our way back to town after a entertaining evening and another ground ticked off for me, one that I had been wanting to visit for some time.
Sunday was spent at Mondello, a lovely little seaside town just outside Palermo and only a 20 mintue bus ride, the rain fell Sunday evening and after a nice local pizza and a couple of good Italian beers the weekend was almost over.
All in all a very good weekend away and especially good to see Juve go top of Serie A with a well executed win.
Til the next time
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