New York Mets 11, New York Yankees 2
I got to the game absurdly early. That was partly because I had no idea how long it would take me to navigate the subway from Brooklyn all the way uptown to the Bronx and Yankee Stadium. Or Yankee Stadia, should I say, because right next to the existing old Yankee Stadium a new one is being built. It's the Yankees' last season at the old place, and amazingly enough it's the Mets' final season at Shea Stadium, too. Well, perhaps not so amazingly. At any rate, what is obvious is that the British mania that every professional sports club from Warrington RLFC to Millwall to Arsenal football club must build itself a new stadium is very much reflected west of the Atlantic. Arriving so early for this Yankees-Mets match-up did give me a chance to look around at the keen earlybird fans of both teams, mixing easily (tickets were clearly unrestricted) exchanging only good-humoured joshing, and gathering around bars to watch basketball on TV before the real game began. Would things really have been quite so relaxed if this were Arsenal against Tottenham? I doubt it.
As so often here, the experience was easier and friendlier than I expected. People helped me find mustard and my seat, and wished me a good game; that was also what I was looking forward to as I tucked into a foot-long hotdog, cheese fries (chips with a gooey, congealed artificial cheese sauce poured over them), and a Miller Lite Beer. All good fun, but I must report that overpriced and disappointing food and drink is not (as I'd imagined) a specificity of British entertainment venues. The game, now. For some reason (it's not in the rules, but every American seems to know it) nothing is allowed to happen in the first two innings, which is just as well since about a quarter of the crowd only arrive in time for the third, perhaps because of pressure of work, perhaps to avoid driving in the congested Bronx. The Yankees are the big team in New York, of course: they're United to the Mets' City, Liverpool to the Mets' Everton, Real to the Mets' Atletico. But although (in as much as I can stomach football at all, the sleazy game that proves that where there's brass there's muck) I am a United supporter, I find there's something off-putting about the Yankees legend. And perhaps because I am so goddamn English, I don't really like a winner and prefer to back the underdog. The game went my way, too: after a big controversy about a ball that hit the foul post (was it a foul ball? Was it a home run? - I'm British, I have no idea) the Mets pasted and pulverised the Yankees by eleven runs to two. But I won't bore you with a detailed game report: you can find that at the New York Times.
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