Soccer

My cousin Mary Cranston is in town, and we went to a soccer game together. This was a friendship match between Belarus and Sweden, but the stadium had a healthy crowd even though the game wouldn't affect either team's standings.

Our friend Sergey Merkulov got the tickets for us, and we met him on the street in front of the stadium. Getting there, we swam through crowds much like getting to a Red Sox game in Boston. The biggest difference was the lack of scalpers here. There's no scalping on hard-to-get ballet tickets either, so I guess it's a general rule.

The stadium was built at the time of the 1966 Moscow Olympics, and there's a big torch at one side for the Olympic flame. (Not lit today.) The seats may also date back to 1966. They are colorful plastic, but over the years they've developed a patina of white dust that comes off on one's clothes. Sergey was prepared for this, and brought a newspaper. We each sat on a sheet from the Minsky Courier, which may be the highest and best use for that particular newspaper.

We encountered security forces everywhere, mostly dressed in army uniforms. They checked our bags and pockets twice, both times with metal detectors and pat-downs. Then when we sat down, we noticed a row of guards along the edge of each section, sitting one above the other two or three rows apart. And then there was the section of the stadium dedicated exclusively to army guys. It felt pretty safe in there.

Sweden won the game 1-0. Belarus took a lot of shots, but they were generally high and the Swedish goalie didn't appear to be under a whole lot of stress. Still, we had high hopes and screamed and yelled now and again. Especially Sergey. He can yell really loudly, and it was a relief when he moved to the row in front of us instead of yelling beside us. His son took care of the from-the-side yelling.

I played a little soccer myself a couple of days before the match, one-on-one with Sergey's young son Matvey. Matvey was nice to me, and when the score got too lopsided he let me get ahead a little. Then he dropped the hammer and won the game handily. He's invited me back for a rematch now that I've had a refresher on how the game looks when played properly. I'm ready.