For the first time in my life I watched a live football match at a stadium. That was the Tusker FC vs Gor played at the Nyayo stadium. At the end of it all the teams shared the spoils and it wasn’t all that bad a day for any of them though the fans would have loved to see some goals.
Being my first time inside Nyayo stadium, I was doing more than watch the flow of the game. First I wanted to confirm the allegations that actually Gor mahia fans are all that violent as I have been meant to understand. Well it turns out that from a general point of view, they are not. Actually the guys I sat next to were quite decent and you could see from the way they talked that this was an integral part of their lives. I will however note that the violence aspect wasn’t exactly absent but only brought up by a small cross-section of the crowd. Just as they say that every market has a mad man there were those who thought that they could possibly change a referees decision by throwing up objects in a trajectory towards the pitch. How barbaric that was!
Therefore basing by arguments from what I experienced on the night of 3rd august 2011, I must acknowledge that the Kenyan football scene has to patch up some aspects before it fully becomes a part of the society where the whole family can consider a weekend match an equally good day out. There is the need to make things professional in the way all the processes are handled. For instance we had to wait until the last thirty minutes before being let into the stadium; that is a recipe for commotion. Am not sure I saw where the restrooms were and men were answering short calls on the stadium walls.
At the end of the match I left the stadium in a happy mood though, looking forward for the next day I would be there and with one thing in mind; that if the overall standards of the Kenyan football scene are to change then there is need to change the overall attitude when it comes to their behavior in the stadium. I now await Rangers FC vs AFC on Friday 5th august.