After we returned from our trip to Granada we attended a Real Betis game that night. It was pretty cold weather by Spain’s standards but thankfully no rain. We arrived as a group about an hour before kickoff and everyone split off to either find food, team gear, or their seats.. Several of us walked to quickly get some street food in time before the Betis anthem. It was the standard stadium fare ie. hot dog (or Frankfurt with crisps), a burger, and a beer. The atmosphere on the streets was electric. We even saw someone with a green flare gun. Looking around it wasn’t hard to identify the “hooligan” fans – young men having fun cheering and chanting about Betis, Rayo (the opponent of the night) or even Sevilla FC (Betis’s big intercity rival). However there were also plenty of families attending too.
In Sevilla, you’re either a Betis fan or a Sevilla FC fan. According to one of our instructors, Betis has a bigger following and more loyal fans than Sevilla but she’s also a Betis fan so there could be some bias there! Getting into the stadium took longer than we were used to due to the older nature of the Betis stadium (which was less equipped to handle the crowds) but once in, it was a lot of fun to see how excited all the fans got when the Betis lineup was being announced. Everyone was singing and chanting the entire game. Betis scored two goals in the first half so we all thought the game was sealed. The team has a 19 year old player, Charly Musonda, on loan from Chelsea that was especially speedy and fun to watch. But right after the second half started, the opposing team scored two goals within three minutes. Now that the game was tied, fans got even more into it and the cheering was almost non-stop. With ten minutes left the game got chippy and quite intense.
Betis had several quality opportunities in the final four minutes of stoppage time (with one shot that ricocheted off crossbar) but in the end they weren’t able to put a goal away. Overall, I think it’s safe to say that this was one of our favorite games to watch out of all the games we’ve been to on this trip. It was the highest scoring and there was so much energy in the crowd.
