Cover Story : Southampton
units. Strange that the club have swapped one
closely hemmed in stadium at The Dell for another!
The lights of the spanking new edifice shone
brightly in the night sky and it has to be said looked
rather out of place in its current surroundings. The
Saints Megastore is well-placed on the approach
road and looked to be doing a steady trade. The
stock was the usual fare served up at new grounds and certainly nothing to take the fancy of the
casual fan. A couple of pleasing points outside the stadium were the unusual provision of outside
toilets for the relief of travel-weary fans and a rather natty bike stand which ran the entire length of
one side. Unfortunately Saints’ fans don’t seem to have caught onto the idea of pedal power and it
was only sparsely populated with cycles.
Inside, the concourses, although mainly
still bare blockwork and piping, were at
least brightened by the addition of large
photographs on the walls of Southampton-associated images. Signage was
also good and the catering outlets
stocked reasonably-priced, if unimaginative, refreshments.
Once in our seats it became obvious
that St. Mary’s was indeed another
Riverside clone. Four wrap-around
sides filled with 32,000 red and white
plastic tip-up seats and a row of executive boxes running along the top of the main stand. There
was a real family atmosphere amongst the 29,000 odd fans present with lots of women, children
and family groups. The homeliness of The Dell seems to have, in spectators at least, transferred
itself to St. Mary’s. We were also quite surprised at the good atmosphere generated as reports had
suggested that this had been lacking in previous matches this season. There were excellent, if
slightly diversionary, video screens at
both ends and the usual deafening
sound system.
The only major problem encountered
during the game were the Wembleyesque queues at the toilets at halftime which not only stopped most
people from seeing the start of the
second half but also blocked exits and
gangways. In short the concourses
were a no-go area for ten minutes
either side of half-time.
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