One evening, one match and caretaker manager, Tony Mowbray was in place to cover the job after the recent "relieving" of manager George Burley. Ipswich town were to take on 10 games in a row without losing, on form club, Burnley FC. This match was special to myself because i was going to take seat in the north satnd for the first ever time.

Why is this an experience:
- The north stand is the only stand that i have not been in at Portman Road.
- It is renound for it containing the troublesome supporters of the town.
- All of the chants start in this stand, and the beer flows like the sea.
- I wanted to see what the people are really like in this place, and if i would sit there again.
- Of course, what the view was like compare to opposite stand, the Greene King Stand.

Brief past happenings with the north stand crowd:
- Pitch invasion starters when Town beat teams such as rivals norwich city and large clubs such as Manchester United. These happenings have happened throughout the life time of Ipswich towns football life and have become much less frequent since the FA decided to take action over the invading of the pitch. These occasions have often lost the clubs money. It is important to say that these invasions have happened over the country and world and i am just making a point that whenever there is one at town, it is started by the north stand.

- If ever there has been one person try and get on the pitch to grab a celebrating player, they have most often been from the north stand, this person will more than likely very excited as well as being fairly drunk. These people though, get taken out by the marshalls within a couple of seconds. Quite interesting to watch i must say.

- If a section of the crowd are ever to show there dis-respect for something, it will be coming from the north stand. This dis-respect to opposing team players, managers or whoever will be coming from them. Not always in dis-respect though, whenever they see a Female Physio they absolutely love it. This only ever happens once every million years and it happened in recent months, it was a european match and they had a female physio and the north stand where full of whistles and chants, so much that she milked it a bit by walking slowly past the north stand fans. They loved it.

Above left, the red areas represent the most angry fans. The more condensed, the more fans. The small yellow dots are where we were sitting.
Above right, the view that we had from where we were sitting. It was very good indeed.

Now for the experience:
I recall it being a fairly chilly evening, but the sky was clear. We headed for the stadium at about 6:30-6:45 time to get there with plently of time before kick-off. This was due at 7:45. We parked the car somewhere on a busy road, so if it was going to get pinched, so be it.

We had a brisk walk towards cardinal park and through past liquid, brannigans and UGC. The number of people around was high as it was a 14 - 17 year old, get down on it, funky disco beats night. We past a number of tartés and continued towards the stadium. The supporters grew in numbers as we came closer to the stadium.

As we did not have our tickets on us due to ordering them over the phone, we had to ask a steward where abouts the kiosk was to pick them up. The directions were given and we headed to wherever we had to go. It ended up meaning to pass the north stand and then go back to it. The tickets were picked up and now we could head back to the north stand and get in there. On the way back to the north stand, some strange people were seen, back street men if you wish. Men with long beards and so on and so forth.

We pass through the turnstiles and we're in. Seats were in the upper section of this whole new north stand. We spent about 10 minutes trying to find the stairs that we needed to go up to our seats. During this 10 minutes i look around the lower section to see thousands of middle age men drinking pints of beer from the many beer bars that are at the bottom of the stand. I would say that there are more beer bars than the other stands because there is a much larger alcohol consumption in this stand.

So we found the stairs, and we went up and up. I vaguely re-call there being another section of beer and hot-dog bars. Of course there are other foods available including the old school pasties, burgers and sausage rolls. All these and much more. So we continued to go up. And then the opening appeared, the flood lights were bright and we stepped out into the stand.

We were directed to were abouts our seats were and then got there and sat down. Looking around at the contruction of the stand, i would say that the build was very good. The view, brilliant. We could see the whole pitch without having to stand to see any of it.

The match had not even started and many of the fans were getting there drunken voices in tune ready for the match. The level of chanting was at low meaning that insults were not yet happening. We waited for kick-off and then the real north stand comes to life.

So Ipswich Town FC vs Burnley FC kicked off to a loud row from the whole crowd. I would then say that it was about 30 seconds before the north stand started their songs and chants. All were normal e.g. "come on you blues" being a possible one to start the match of with.

After just a minute of the match, Ipswich had a free-kick of which the supporters loved and because it was in a promising position it made it even better. Venus with the free-kick into the area and then John McGreal got his head onto it and a brilliant headed goal put town 1 - 0 ahead at a very point in the game and the crowd went wild. North stand soon started the "There's only one John McGreal, one john mcgrrreeaall!" and so on.

The excitement was soon lost though as the whole crowd were silenced by an easy headed goal after 5minutes of play. A goal infront of the north stand end made things worse. It was now 1 - 1. When Ipswich restarted the crowd were clearly agitated by letting in sch a soft goal. For the next few minutes i heard the fans of the north stand expressing there anger, comments such "god we are sh*t, load of c*ap, f**k, aahhhh. Where's my beer!". It was clearly a stressful time for the north stand lads.

The happiness was restored though within 10 mins. After 15 minutes of play, and the score at 1 - 1 Darren Ambrose scores a great turning volley. Now the fans loved that. 2 -1 with 15mins played. Chants and happiness were restored and north stand was happy. The fans got behind their team again.

Half time arrived, and the score was still 2 - 1 to town. The atmosphere was good. The north stand regulars went to get there half time beverages. The bloke infront came back with a pastie and was rather impressed by the quality. He started having a whole conversation about the quality of it. They were loving it and became jealous, they sent one off to get some more pasties.

The match restarted and the team was still the same. Town started with great attacking force. No chanting as yet as many of the supporters were on the pasties and burgers still. About 10-15mins into the second half and they started again. A number of rash decisions were made against town and it was clear that the north stan fans were not happy. Roars and individual comments were apparent through the stand.

Andy Marshall recieved a number of sarcastic cheers whenever he kicked the ball properly by the north stand fans. I even felt myself getting tense as he went to kick any moving ball. The comments were harsh whenever a bad kick was had, but what do you expect when you have the north stand behind you back and you used to be the keeper for towns biggest rivals.

The second half went on and it looked like town were going to win there first match in the division one for quite some time. This looked promising to help Mowbrays chance of becoming towns new manager. The fans were happy although worried about some errors that had beeen occuring in the defence.

90 minutes was so close, the match looked won. A last minute corner to Burnely. It was the 89th minute and the crowd were getting behind the team. The corner came in, and a burnely palyer got a head to it. It went in, and the score was 2 - 2, this was not what was needed. North stand had became very very upset. The final whistle went and boring commenced. An undeserved loss and the north stand experience had ended.

We quickly walked out of the stand without saying a word to each other. We headed to the car that had not been piched. We drove home.

Conclusion:
The north stand is like a family, a drunken yet friendly family. They have feelings, and emotions as well. They want to see their team win so much that bursts of angry lines come out. They do not mean no harm, they are all brothers and sisters of the football team. They just dont want to see them get beaten at the last hurdle.

The experience was good, the view was great and the crowd have the emotion i like at a match of football. Will i sit in the north stand again, for sure i will.

Article Written By Ryan