I am now the proud owner of a brace of season tickets for the Leeds Rhinos thanks to the former owners decision to emigrate to Bulgaria to start up a guest house business.
Not just any old season tickets though, these are Carnegie Stand seating tickets.
And not just any old Carnegie Stand seating tickets, these are centre section seating tickets.
And not just any old centre section seating tickets, these are back row centre section seating tickets.
Apparently the best view in the house in the newest stand in Super League - we'll see on Friday night at the Wakefield game.
It was 1966 when I went to my first game of rugby league, England had just won the football world cup, the year before Leeds Utd had been beaten by Liverpool in the FA Cup final and I was nagging at our dad to let me go to Elland Rd, home of said Leeds Utd, but the word "hooligan" had started to creep into football and he didn't want me to be exposed to the foul and abusive language that pervaded the round ball game (I was a delicate child and did not swear at all until my wedding day) and so he agreed to let me attend the Headingley ground of the Leeds Rugby League Football Club, being that it was only up the hill from where we lived and would save on bus fares, and of course I never heard any foul language at the rugby matches did I, oh no.
The full story of that very first visit to a rugby league game is fully described here but I've been hooked ever since and whilst I've owned a season ticket for many of the intervening years I've never owned one for the sitting down part of the ground, it just seems all wrong to sit down and watch sport, sitting down is for cinemas and theatres, sport is for standing up and not having a very good view because the fat bloke in front of you is also tall.
So on Friday night I finally seccumb to the world of the seated spectator, I expect that I shall applaud lightly when the team enter the field of play and utter mild rebuke such as "dear, dear" when the referee makes a poor decision and the most animated I will become is when my team score and I fling my top hat in the air with a loud and hearty "hurrah".
Theres a new world waiting for me there in the Carnegie Stand...
3 comments:
You're barking up the wrong tree Gary, and by tree I obviously mean code. Get yourself down to Welford Road and watch the Tigers playing rugby the way God intended.
Well you see, we are craftier than that here in Leeds for of course we get two codes for the price of one at Headingley.
Not literally two for one but my brother is keen on taking these tickets for the Tykes as he coaches u-9's at his local RU club.
And of course I'm even crafter than the average bear as having a geordie wife means that I get to arrange visits oop north that coincide with Newcastle Falcons games.
So its a plethora of rugby here then :)
I have been looking for this Rhino image forever! Do you mind telling me where you linked from?
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