Gillingham

Ground: Priestfield Stadium

Visits: 1

Date: 4th January 2009

Match: Gillingham - Aston Villa 1-2 (FA-Cup)

Attendance: 10 107

There were only two matches in England this Sunday, Gillingham-Aston Villa and Southampton-Manchester U. I was pretty confident of getting a ticket for the Gillingham game but when the match went to General Sale it was not possible to buy online and when I finally came through over the phone the match was sold-out. Even the Hospitality seats (at £60) were sold-out. I feared I had to some touristing in London but help was to come my way. When I asked for help on the footballgroundguide message board Gillingham fan Joe (GMB) offered me a spare ticket, for which I am very grateful !

The journey to Gillingham, from Victoria, went without any problems and as I was a bit early I went up to the ground to take some pictures. While doing that I was approached by a policeman, I had done nothing wrong though, he was probably a bit bored and we had a chat about football and other important things. After meeting up with Joe and his friends we went to a pub before heading to the ground.

Priestfield Stadium is an old-style English ground, nice and tidy, tucked in with the neighbouring houses (see picture below). Our seats were in the Gordon Road Stand and being in the second row meant we could almost touch the players. The only negative part of the ground is the open Brian Moore Stand, which house the away fans. As there was no rain this afternoon the 1,500 Villa fans could enjoy their victory without being soaked.

This was a proper cup tie, great atmosphere in a sold-out lower league ground and with the winner coming from a controversial penalty Villa were a bit lucky to win this match.

rear of gordon road stand