“I pretended to be disappointed”

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Like many other Jurassic, Christian* is a fan of FC Basel. The twenty-something has loved the club “since birth”, he says. In 2013, he sat in front of television when Basel made a historic place for the semi-finals of the Europa League against Tottenham Hotspur.

Now, ten years later, he is old enough to see the European successes of his favorite club live in the stadium. When the Conference League quarter-finals were drawn, he wanted to travel to Nice with three friends for the away game. On the same day the flight to the Côte d’Azur was booked.

The bad news came on the morning of the second leg: France banned FCB fans from entering the stadium, partly because of the potential for violence in the Basel crowd. Undeterred by the ban, Christian and his colleagues instead bought tickets intended for Nice fans. With a look, Christian talks about his unique evening in the midst of Nice fans.

Blick: Two days ago things didn’t look good for the Basel fans who wanted to travel to Nice. Have you ever thought about canceling the trip?
FCB fan Christian: No, we imagined it more like a holiday in the south of France, in Nice. If we hadn’t made it to the game, this is how it would have gone. And deep down there was always a little hope that things would work out. We told ourselves that worst case scenario we would try to get tickets on the spot. That’s how it happened.

We can imagine that you have had a special day…
We were walking the Promenade des Anglais for an hour in Nice when we heard that the ban was official. Of course we were disappointed.

Was it an option for you to join the FCB fans in Sanremo?
When we saw that they wanted to meet in Sanremo, we thought it was a bit far away. It would have been 45 minutes by taxi or two hours by train. If we didn’t have seats we would have gone to a bar or hotel to watch the game.

What did you do then?
We searched for tickets on reseller platforms. At Viagogo there were four tickets for 18 euros each. We thought it was probably a scam at this price. But we tried – and it worked.

So you had no problem getting into the stadium with those tickets?
Three of the four tickets were accepted, one was not. But security said to itself, “This is a group, it’s probably a technical error.” So one of us entered the stadium without a valid ticket.

Didn’t security ask you which club you support?
We bought a match scarf that said Nice – Basel so we wouldn’t go to the stadium empty handed and people wouldn’t ask us too many questions. However, this did not work with our chair neighbor.

What do you mean?
We sat down and the man next to us started talking to us. After five minutes he said: “You’re for Basel, aren’t you?” He recognized our accent and knew we were not from Nice. But he was a nice guy and things went well.

So you didn’t even try to copy the Southern French accent?
(laughs) We could have tried, but I don’t think it would have worked.

Did you also meet other Basel fans in the stadium?
Not far from us sat a German-Swiss boy who did not care about the rules. Everyone looked at him strangely, but he didn’t care. In the end nothing happened.

Have you never been afraid of being discovered?
We were as calm as possible and didn’t celebrate our goals too loudly. At the end of the game, we tried not to be too loud and not to show that we were happy. I was not afraid of reactions from Nice fans. But being here was illegal and I didn’t want to be kicked out of the stadium and get in trouble with the police.

Did you have to hold back a lot when Basel equalized?
We tried to concentrate, but it was hard. Especially because of the tension in the stadium.

Then came the winning goal.
I covered my face with my hands and pretended to be disappointed. But in my head I was celebrating.

*Name changed

Source : Blick