Kwame Dwomoh writes: Matchday experience at the Signal Iduna Park

Published on: 21 October 2019

Who said the German Bundesliga doesn’t rank up there with the very best in the world? A lot of Ghanaians would have had the privilege of following some of the biggest stars in the Bundesliga in the early 90’s when GTV through its association with Transtel brought viewers highlights of the games on match days.

They were great for many a viewer especially with Tony Yeboah’s goals scoring feats of the 93/94 season and the 94/95 seasons where he won the top scorer award. Even on Television one could tell how passionate these fans were and how they energized players to go out there and give everything.

I had an experience of a lifetime courtesy StartTimes’ Media Tour with an opportunity to see the game between Borussia Dortmund and Borussia Monchengladbach, the latter being top of the league and the former desperate to close the gap on the leading pack.

My residence since I have been in the City of Dortmund has been the picturesque Steigenberger Hotel, which is about ten minutes’ walk to the Signal Iduna Park. All the talk in the City and the Hotel since I got into town last Thursday had been about this game and its importance to Dortmund’s season.

Having blown away a healthy lead last season, they had acquired the services of emerging talents including Thorgan Hazard and Julian Brandt and the experienced Matt Hummels to compete a lot strongly with Bayern but things have not panned out the way Lucien Favre’s side would have wanted so far this season. They desperately needed this result to restore that belief in competing strongly for the Bundesliga title this season.

The Dortmund Match day experience would blow you away. The thousands of fans making their way to the Stadium on foot and blurring out tunes in anticipation of a result, the food stalls selling all kinds of stuff, the paraphernalia, The music. It’s just amazing.

I had the opportunity of meeting the Managing Director of the Yellow and Blacks Carsten Cramer with the rest of my Media Colleagues from the globe over who gave us a thorough insight into the clubs ambitions and plans in the short, medium and long term which focused on revenues, team development and the need to improve Community-club relations.

We got to the stadium a little over two hours to the game but there was so much to keep everyone company. We were led by the DFL team to a well set out Media Centre where one could eat and drink as much as they could and also get to predict the half time and full time scorelines on the media board all in the name of whipping up interest and excitement even amongst the journos.

We made our way into the Stands and enjoyed the atmosphere from the warm up and the songs being belted out. The imposing yellow wall with all their choreography gets your attention instantly. 25,000 fans on their feet screaming and singing at the top of their voices.

The game itself was a classy one with German Star Marco Reus scoring the only goal of the game and most importantly a crucial three points much to the delight of the home fans having had two goals disallowed by VAR. 81,365 fans creating an incredible match day experience.

The Post match acts were just as refreshing as the pre-match with thousands of these fans making their way to the huge stalls and Stadium eating areas for their dinner, club products and an after party of a sort.

I spent a total of close to six hours at the Signal Iduna Park but every moment was worth it. How I would love to see these being incorporated on the local scene in Ghana. It’s not just about the 90 minutes of action. Football has gone way beyond that now. It’s a huge business with the potential to even do better in an emerging market like Ghana.

Personally, it was an opportunity to learn and live the moment.

Thanks to the StarTimes Media Tour team and the DFL crew for making it happen.

 

Thanks for your time.

 

The writer, Kwame Dwomoh-Agyemang is the Sports Editor at Class 91.3, a presenter at GTV Sports + and an Adjunct Communications lecturer at Pentecost and Knutsford University College. You can follow him on Facebook: Kwame Dwomoh Agyemang, and on twitter @DwomohKwame1.

 

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