FC Lustenau gegen Austria Lustenau

Posted on 18 Nov by Jackson Crawford

Friday November 16th
I went with Beni, Michi, and Alex to a Lustenau soccer game tonight. It was a really intense game because it was the two Lustenau teams playing against each other. At a smaller scale, it is the equivalent of Cat-Griz here! We took the bus from Schwarzach to Lustenau and walked through a back alley to take a short cut to the stadium. Once we arrived there we walked around the other side to the Austria Lustenau side (the team they were supporting). Already, at 7:30, people were yelling and cheering and the game didn't start until an hour later. It was mostly young adults there, but as time went on around 5,000 people attended the game. There were large bleachers set up on either end of the field, for the rowdy supporters, then a seated area that spanned the length of the left side, were the more civilized people were sitting. Before the game started, the Austria Lustenau fans had hung up banners and handed out small signs to hold up during the game. As the players warmed up, the fans got more and more rowdy, cheering and chanting favorite players names. Once such player is an 18 year old kid from Schwarzach (he went to kindergarden with Clara) who plays goalie. He was excellent, and a star player for the team. I am still not exactly sure what level of professionalism the game was, as they were adults of varying ages playing, and Bene said that they chose it as a job and get paid (I think haha). But they are not at the professional level. People move on to the professional league from here, but until then I can;t imagine that they make much money at all! Anyway, the game started and the entire game a few really inspired fans were leading us in cheers and chants. They had a megaphone and organized us to hold to signs up, etc. It was pretty exhilarating! It turned out to be really close, but in the end Austria Lustenau won 1-0, and everybody went wild. When we were finished we took the bus back to Dornbirn, it was fairly late, and we met these 3 dudes that were apparently meeting an Indian guy at the train station. One of them gave me a small doughnut, and the entire ride the only thing he said to me was "You are welcome for the doughnut" "You are lucky to have gotten that doughnut" "I am sure you are going to tell your friends about that doughnut" and so on. They were pretty funny. I met up with Thomas when in Dornbirn, then we went to Cafe Sito and 7er to hang out with a couple other kids. We didn't do much else, just kind of chilled and talked. Afterward I took the bus to the Bahnhof and caught the train home. I forgot how far the train station in Schwarzach was from home, and it ended up taking me about a half hour to get home. Overall, a really fun night!