lupestripe | My First Football Match - Barnsley 2-1 Middlesbrough

Okay, it wasn't MY first football match but it was Wolfie's and it was my first match for about two years. It was also my first away match for over four and it was good to be back amongst the fans again (about five years ago I went to 16 out of our 19 matches away from home in a grand tour of the British Isles).

The atmosphere was great, with constant singing throughout, and there was a great sense of tribal camaraderie that you often get at a football game. I had forgotten just how loyal and passionate our fans are and the sense of community and local pride that is often fostered at such events.

We walked around the ground whilst sampling hot dogs, chips and a goregous meat and potato pie. *noms* There's nothing better (and poorer quality) than football food whilst soaking up the matchday experience. People were selling programmes and Half Time Lucky Draw tickets in broad Barnsley accents. We were told to avoid the black ice by one Barnsley lady whilst my accent brought inquisitive stares from some of the younger Tykes fans. Unfortunately, there was no alcohol being served in or around the ground - a sad and increasingly common situation presumedly done to stop crowd trouble. It's always good to have two or three pints before an afternoon of raucous singing I find and it's a sad case of the minority spoiling it for the rest of us. Still, never mind.

Barnsley's ground is a combination of traditional Victorian and new all-seater stadia. It's set in a valley which had nice views over part of the town. This trapped the noise of the crowd and added to the atmosphere (I say noise of the crowd, the home fans were typically quiet whereas we were extremely noisy).

Before the game, we goaded the Barnsley mascot, a cute sassy brown dog called Toby Tyke. He had a bright black nose. Toby was up for some verbal sparring and darted from the centre circle with the ball before burying it in the empty net. He then celebrated in front of our fans to chants of "Who are ya?!". He turned around, wiggled his bum at the crowd and pointed to the name on the back of his shirt. It was unbelievably cute. He also tried to shake paws with some of our fans but he took his paw away at the last minute. He was such a scamp. All good natured fun.

The match itself was pretty rubbish but then Middlesbrough (my team) have fallen so far in the last four years that I wasn't expecting much. And football is often more about the occasion than the sport so we both still had a really great time - despite us freezing our knackers (and feet - trainers are far from appropriate attire in December) for three hours. Without getting into tactics, we played a 4-5-1 formation and were overrun in midfield against an average Barnsley side. We need to buy and buy well when the January transfer window opens.

We took the lead through a Justin Hoyte cross-cum-shot in the first half that was intended for the penalty area but somehow found the top corner of the net. Cue pandamonium at our end, with strangers hugging each other and dancing on the terraces (terraces in which we stood up for the whole match - something that is now discouraged at the more sanitised stadia in the country. This only added to the atmosphere). At half-time we were 1-0 up, having had the better of the play. In fact, we looked comfortable.

Unfortunately, Boro are a team of two halves and decided to gift Barnsley two goals early in the second period of play. Both came from poor crosses down the left which were deflected around the box before falling to an unmarked player who had the simple task of nodding the ball home. Poor marking, poor defending, typical Boro. After that, we didn't really look like getting into the game and the away crowd got more and more nasty as the game went on. By the end, we had just given up and slumped to a 2-1 defeat. The familar feeling of resignation and disappointment as we trudged out of the stadium was somewhat comforting.

After the game, we took the opportunity to look around the delightful town of Barnsley. There are a lot of pubs there (and very little else) so we settled in one and had a post-match drink (as is tradition) as we waited for the crowd of 18,000 to disperse (the train station was typically busy and there is never any real need to battle through the crowds when an hour later, everyone has gone home). An hour later and after another brief look around - we saw the beautiful town hall building and the fact that the level crossing outside the station makes Barnsley a little like Lincoln - we headed home for pizza and doner meat. Seriously, the amount of crap food I ate yesterday was somewhat unprecedented, even for me.

We both had a good time though - even Wolfie enjoyed it, despite admitting it wasn't really his thing. Still, he got to goad me about our glorious defeat for the entire ride home...