Euro Cup 2012

 

So on Friday night, after a day in Lidice and Terezin, we went to live viewing of the Euro Cup in Old Town Square! It was the Czech Republic vs. Russia. The entire place was NUTS!! Not that I really expected it not to be though . . . We got there about 20 minutes into the first half and could barely squeeze into the back. At half time though it cleared up a ton-- people went to go get more drinks-- so we moved practically right up to the front! This half was definitely a lot more interesting, 1) we could actually see and 2) all of the hardcore fans we up there so it was really entertaining watching them cheer.

I was really surprised at the huge crowd that Russia drew in! The first half we weren't sure whether Czech was red or white, and after red scored and the huge outburst of cheers, we just figured red, but minutes later something else happened and it turned out Czech was the white team . . . SO many Russians!

Czech was losing 2-1 a majority of the game, but Russia really killed them in the last 10 or so minutes, making it 4-1. At that point we decided to go to beat the crowd in the metro. Just as we had made it out off to the side of the front, TONS of people started running out from where we had just been in the crowd, towards our general direction. It looked like something out of a movie when something horrible happens and everyone from the crowd all runs away at once. When we had walked into the crowd toward the beginning of the game, I remeber telling Katherine and Karen that this was the type of crowd it would be horrible to be caught up in if something bad happened. So seeing everyone run out, we all freaked out for a second and were ready to book it out of there, right when we saw the cause of the problem-- cops were breaking up a fight between some fans, right at the front. So after the initial rush of people no one else came running out, but it had been really scary at first . . .

It was cool to see all of this put together for the games. I'm not sure when the games go until, but we've already been back for a second and may continue to go to others if we're looking for something to do!

I found these videos on YouTube, and they generally look like Old Town Square did that night . . . Unfortunately they aren't loading well so I haven't actually been able to fully watch them and hope there isn't anything super inappropriate-- my apologies if there is!