First of all, I have to make a confession. I am well and truly a novice when it comes to Soccer/Footer/Football whatever you call it. My knowledge about the sport lasts only as much as Milkha Singh's understanding about Chess or Anand's knowhow about the complexities of Athletics. To add to that, my performance in Soccer has been equivalent to the amount of goals scored by Sachin in Hockey and runs scored by Dhanraj for Indian Cricket. Albeit being such a connoisseur, Manchester United Stadium Tour was the first thing I did when I landed in Manchester during the last long weekend. After all, I must admit, I stay amidst Soccer maniacs and have never been able to insulate myself. Did I have an option?
After having done the tour myself, I would vehemently advocate it for any sport enthusiast, even if you are not a MANU fan. There are three main parts of the tour. First is the tour of the MANU Museum which takes you through the rich history of the Club that is on its way to its Centenary Celebration next year. Second and the most exciting part is the guided Stadium tour. The guide takes you not only thorough the spectator area to have a look at the stadium but also showcases the illustrious MANU dressing room, the players dug out area giving insights into the match day rituals. The guide also parades you though the players entrance to the ground with a similar music in the background. Throughout the tour you can afford to hallucinate as if you are a top league Soccer player, if not a star. I did just that as seen in the photo below:
Yours Truly!!! Can we say Guru with No. 10.5 playing for MANU?The most exciting thing during the tour was that there were a lot of school boys touring MANU in groups. No wonder MANU catches these guys right in their teens.
Schoolboys on a MANU tour. Wonderful!!!
MANU catches 'em young. This young?Third and last part of the tour was the MANU Mega store where you can purchase balls, players' jourseys and other souvenirs if you like. Even if you don't, it's very much worthwhile to have to look at the whole merchandise and the amount of business that has been generated out of a single club. Given the Indian population strength and the IPL fan following world over, do not be surprized if one of the present IPL teams becomes pseudo MANU of the IPL in a decade or two. I won't be surprized for sure...
