Taksim Square 25th May 2005 – did you watch the match there?

[Guest counterpart]

I am a writer wanting to talk to, or correspond with, any ticketless Liverpool fans who actually watched the match on the big screen in Taksim Square on that momentous night last year. My email is pwb43@hotmail.com

[TurnstileB]

Everyone got a ticket!

[Guest counterpart]

Everyone got a ticket! - clearly everybody didn't get a ticket with them changing hands for up to £600 each and with media reports about the great atmosphere in front of the big screen in Taksim during and after the match. I also read stories about fans walking out of Ataturk at half time thinking there was no way back from being 3-0 down and finding, when they got back to Taksim. that events had been turned on their head.

[DJLJ]

Well, they would have had an easier ride back than us. Stayed until the end, was in the middle of the queue of busses leaving the stadium, ended up in the lane with the broken down bus, everyone else passed us by. Got lost on the highways with 1 other bus. In the end we reached Taksim Square at 5.15 and our hotel at 6. Not much partying in Taksim Square at 5.15 though...

[Uncle Travelling Matt]

The Turks were trying to get £600 for tickets in the build up but as the match grew closer and demand wasn't there (AC only took about 15,000 max), the prices dropped and there were plenty of tickets available at face value, you couldn't give them away outside the stadium. I doubt there will have been many fans in Taksim Square until 2am......if there were, it was a long way to travel to then decide not to go to the stadium!

[El Rojo]

The Turks were trying to get £600 for tickets in the build up but as the match grew closer and demand wasn't there (AC only took about 15,000 max), the prices dropped and there were plenty of tickets available at face value, you couldn't give them away outside the stadium. I doubt there will have been many fans in Taksim Square until 2am......if there were, it was a long way to travel to then decide not to go to the stadium!

 

I met a guy outside the stadium with 2 spares that he wasn't able to shift - for face value. Would have been a different story in a more easily accessible city though.

[Guest counterpart]

Re: Taksim Square 25th May 2005 – did you watch the match there?

 

So in the end tickets, outside the stadium, were back to costing no more than face value; but some supporters having tried in vain to get them at an affordable price the day before and on the morning of the match, in and around Taksim, and having maybe tried to get to the ground and experienced part or all of the horrendous journey to Ataturk, would have thought better of trying to get inside the stadium, cut their losses and returned to Taksim, knowing they were guaranteed a view of the game.

[Bob]

Re: Taksim Square 25th May 2005 – did you watch the match there?

 

So in the end tickets, outside the stadium, were back to costing no more than face value; but some supporters having tried in vain to get them at an affordable price the day before and on the morning of the match, in and around Taksim, and having maybe tried to get to the ground and experienced part or all of the horrendous journey to Ataturk, would have thought better of trying to get inside the stadium, cut their losses and returned to Taksim, knowing they were guaranteed a view of the game.

 

you really are a journalist arent you. You hear people tell you something, over and over again, but it would ruin your story, so you make something up. No-one at all has suggested what you just said, so are you allowed to make things up?

[El Rojo]

Re: Taksim Square 25th May 2005 – did you watch the match there?

 

So in the end tickets, outside the stadium, were back to costing no more than face value; but some supporters having tried in vain to get them at an affordable price the day before and on the morning of the match, in and around Taksim, and having maybe tried to get to the ground and experienced part or all of the horrendous journey to Ataturk, would have thought better of trying to get inside the stadium, cut their losses and returned to Taksim, knowing they were guaranteed a view of the game.

 

I didn't meet one person at the actual stadium looking for spares. As you say, maybe people had given up by then and decided to stay in the city.

 

As I remember it, flights to Istanbul were a bigger nightmare than tickets. I'd imagine few enough travelled without tickets, and those that did got sorted over there. Obviously if they bought them from Turkish touts on the Monday or Tuesday they would have paid tout price, but there were certainly many tickets availabe at cost price from genuine fans on the day.

[Guest counterpart]

In reply to RedRobMol - No, not a journalist – a writer! I have a story to tell which has some peripheral connection with the Miracle of Istanbul and, contrary to what you are suggesting, I had heard that there was a great audience and atmosphere in Taksim during the game. If it’s an invention the it belongs to some else. It is now that I am trying to verify the details of that account that cracks are beginning to appear. Surely you are not criticizing me for wanting to be sure of the truth.

[Uncle Travelling Matt]

Re: Taksim Square 25th May 2005 – did you watch the match there?

 

So in the end tickets, outside the stadium, were back to costing no more than face value; but some supporters having tried in vain to get them at an affordable price the day before and on the morning of the match, in and around Taksim, and having maybe tried to get to the ground and experienced part or all of the horrendous journey to Ataturk, would have thought better of trying to get inside the stadium, cut their losses and returned to Taksim, knowing they were guaranteed a view of the game.

 

What you are saying may well be true but I would be VERY surprised if this amounted to any more than 100 people, I was there for the 5 days before the final, I seen plenty of people offering tickets but not one person looking for one.

[Guest counterpart]

With no-one admitting to having watched the match on the big screen in Taksim it does rather appear that the in-match party atmosphere there is purely aapocryphal.

[Bob]

In reply to RedRobMol - No, not a journalist – a writer! I have a story to tell which has some peripheral connection with the Miracle of Istanbul and, contrary to what you are suggesting, I had heard that there was a great audience and atmosphere in Taksim during the game. If it’s an invention the it belongs to some else. It is now that I am trying to verify the details of that account that cracks are beginning to appear. Surely you are not criticizing me for wanting to be sure of the truth.

 

apologies for being so critical. I thought you were making an assumption in your previous post from things that werent there. I do not criticise you for checking your sources, it just sounded like you were twisting things to invent something, again apologies.

[Guest counterpart]

On the contrary – I have to admit to having been a long way down that route and now it seems I need to rethink. It won’t be the facts of what happened to the team and the supporters, especially in Istanbul, that gets changed but the way my own narrative fits around it.

[Guest Devils Advocate]

Problem you maybe facing is that everyone who made it to istanbul, now says they were in the ataturk for the game, same old story at key historical events, like every liberal yank over the age of 50 was at woostock...

[Guest counterpart]

that thought has occurred to me and that is why I would really like to talk to someone who did see the gme in Taksim even if he/she was there all on his/her ownsome. They can email me so there's no need to lose face over it. I have also read that a contingent from the Kensington pub left at half-time because they were so depressed with being 0-3 down and headed back to Taksim.