First, the stadium where the team plays, San Siro, is amazing. It's huge (...). We were in a cab driving to the stadium and as we turned the corner, it just popped up out of nowhere (...). This behemoth can hold 86,000 people.
And because people get crazy at soccer matches, they make it really really difficult to seat jump (aka paying for a cheap ticket, then moving to a better seat); There are walls between each section that prevent you from moving through.
Now, I don't pretend to be a soccer fan at all. I don't really even pretend to know the rules. Past 5th grade, when I could bend it better than Beckham, it's been all downhill. In fact, I find the game to be boring...the field (excuse me, the pitch) is so big, you might as well be watching a track meet. With this in mind, you should now believe me when I say that this game was a damn awesome soccer game. We saw everything you'd want to see in a game...one-on-one scoring, headers for goals, come from behind win, and even a bicycle kick.
Nike sponsors their matches...apparently so does Big Sky...
The story is that Inter Milan won their league a week ago (there are no playoffs in their league) so this game was essentially meaningless. This was their 17th championship. After having let the other team tie the game up at 1-1, Ibrahimovic for Inter scored a 1-on-1 goal to take a 2-1 lead. This is Ibra as he scores the goal.
They eventually lost the lead and actually went down 3-2. At which point, Inter had many chances to tie the game up...and actually did twice, before being called off for offsides. One of these called offsides was actually a bicycle kick...not just an attempt, but my man, Muntari, actually kicked it into the goal. My thinking is that for that kind of play, you have to just give it to him...but that's just me.
Well, Inter finally tied the game up and didn't take long to score the winning goal. In fact the way they did it was by Ibrahimovic's behind the back kick for a score. And of course the only proper celebration for scoring the game winning goal behind your back is to take your shirt off.
Then they had the trophy ceremony afterwards for their 17th championship.
One of the coolest parts about the experience is the fans. These are the loudest, most boisterous fans ever. Imagine all 87000 people standing and cheering at the same time for the whole game. They did not tire. In fact, one section (about 15,000 people...enough for a basketball stadium) did not stop cheering. They had a song for everything...good or bad. If someone got injured on the other team (which they liked) or a ref made a bad call, they would all start to whistle in unison. Every player had his own little song which they sang when he scored.
The most interesting cheer, though, is the song they sing for the entire team. In unison they start jumping up and down and sing "Chi non salta...milanista...e'...e'". Im not sure exactly what this means...but roughly it translates to "Get on your feet and start jumping for Inter Milan". And then they jumped, too. I'll upload a video of this as soon as internet is affordable again.
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