Armenia beat Russia 0-0

Last Saturday night Susan and I and a few dozen other volunteers went to the Armenia-Russia football (soccer) game at Republican Stadium in Yerevan. The game is part of the UEFA European Football Championship, the main football competition of the men's national football teams governed by UEFA (the Union of European Football Associations), and Armenia is doing better than ever. But Russia was leading the group and a strong favorite to win.

Not everything went smoothly. The crowd control couldn't have been worse. For instance, there were lines of policemen blocking our way, occasionally opening up to let a few through, with no apparent logic except to frustrate everyone. Tickets weren't really checked. And quite a few of us volunteers - along with maybe hundreds of other ticket holders - couldn't get in to see the game. The police, who were seemingly in charge of everything, simply closed the gates well before the game started and refused to let anyone pass. Well, one volunteer, Kate, managed to convince some cop to let about half a dozen of us sneak in about half an hour after the game had started, but many others were stuck elsewhere. We're guessing the reason behind the gate closure was that they wanted to keep out a lot of the Russian fans.

Inside, some of the Armenian spectators cheered us - we're obvious foreigners, and I'm sure they appreciated the support.

The game itself was fun, even though we sat far from much of the action. Both teams played an aggressive game and there were plenty of close situations. Who cares if it was scoreless? Little Armenia held back the big bad bear.

One wave did go around a few times. Chants were basic. Fans were well-behaved: no hooligans that I could see. More games to come. We're cheering for Armenia.