My first match – South Africa is doing it well!!

Today I went to my first match of the soccer world cup – Portugal vs North Korea DPR at the Cape Town Stadium.

The match was a walk over with Portugal winning 7 nil against North Korea DPR essentially ending the goal drought of Christian Ronaldo (Portugal Captain) and the Cape Town Stadium. Captain Cristiano Ronaldo ended his two year wait for an international goal. The “Cape Town curse” was also finally broken.

This victory, and the 3 – 1 victory of Brazil over Ivory Coast makes it even more difficult for Ivory Coast qualify. Given that Ivory Coast is one of the stronger African teams, I would really like to see them making the next round. I also think that they really got a bum deal in the match with Brazil, with the referee allowing the second goal, which was clearly a hand ball (not once, but twice). Brazil is a great team and certainly does not need the referee to be helping them. I was therefore hoping that Portugal would not win by two large a margin – clearly this was not to be. I am sure that 7 nil is the highest score in this world cup so far.

Anyway, the logistics was great. This was the first match in Cape Town that was held during the day (it started at 13h30) on a work day. It was easy to get to the stadium. I had my kids with me and therefore parked in a parkade in the CBD and got the shuttle from outside Civic Centre. Everything went smoothly. There was minimal queuing (no more than you would expect at an event of this magnitude). The attendance at the stadium was just under 64 000. However it was very easy to get to the stadium, into the stadium, to our seats, out of the stadium and back to Civic Centre on the shuttle. The whole system worked, and worked well. I was impressed. Even my tickets (which were the cheapest tickets – category 4) were fine. I was happy with where I sat and the view that I had.

I have travelled quite extensively and been to large events all over the world, and I thought that this experience was world class. Well done South Africa!!! I think that we have shown the naysayer that we can do it. From my experience and from what I can see, South Africa is hosting this world cup with ease. I hope the world is sitting up and taking notice of what we can do when we set our minds to it.

I am looking forward to my next match which will be a night game – so it will be a different experience.