I was so happy when I saw the Seattle skyline rise up in the distance on Thursday. While I may have seen some incredible places, met some interesting people, and thoroughly enjoyed my trip, there is nothing like coming home to my favorite city in the world.
For the third-place game two days later (the first during my time in Seattle), I went to the George and Dragon, Fremont’s famous soccer pub. This wasn’t my first time at the English pub - I had previously watched my favorite club, Arsenal, play their match against rivals Tottenham Hotspur in the FA Cup’s third round (round of 64) this past January at 9am. Even at that early hour, the place was busy. Arsenal supporters took up one side of the bar and Tottenham supporters the other. The two sets of fans didn’t really interact much, but the atmosphere was electric, and by 11am I was celebrating along with the rest of the right side of the bar as Arsenal walked out 2-0 winners. In short, I had high expectations.
However, it was a quiet day at the George and Dragon for the third place game. While there were a lot of people there, only a couple were wearing Brazilian colors, and only two were in Dutch orange. The place was rather quiet. After the humiliation their team received at the hands of the Germans, the Brazilian fans were more subdued than usual, and two Dutch goals in the first fifteen minutes didn’t really help matters. Still, I had fun. The drinks and food were good, and I spent the match talking about soccer with my parents and two Brazilian men sitting next to us. In the end, the Dutch won bronze with a 3-0 victory (the first time any team has been shut out in the third place game since Bulgaria lost to Sweden 4-0 in 1994), and the crowd exited rapidly.
I then went to talk to the bartenders. Because I had been away from Seattle for the entire World Cup, and I wanted to know what had been going on in my hometown during the competition.
The people working at the bar were very kind, and willing to talk about all the fun experiences they’d had working during the World Cup. The George and Dragon was packed for many matches of the World Cup, especially in the group stage. One of the women told me that she had to work every day for the first two weeks to deal with the crowds. Everyone showed up full of hope to watch their team. As the tournament went on, some of the crowds thinned as teams got eliminated, but the showing has been very strong for the entire competition.
Aside from the expected masses of Americans and Englishmen, there had been huge contingents of Germans, Argentinians, Dutch, Brazilians, Mexicans, and Colombians. As the tournament progressed, a lot of people came to show CONCACAF (North and Central America’s soccer federation) solidarity with surprises Costa Rica as well. But the biggest surprises of the tournament were the large numbers of Iranians and Algerians, both of whom took up the entire outside deck for their teams’ matches. The Iranians in particular were a delight to host, dancing and cheering throughout their (short) stay in the tournament.
I then asked for particular stories or moments that had stuck in the memories of the bartenders. The first one that came to mind was a fan that they had all dubbed “Tambourine Lady.” A Brazilian woman had come in for a match (they forgot which one) with a tambourine that she banged so hard that it broke mid-match. The bartenders were somewhat grateful for this, as it had been loud and annoying. Another fan that came to mind was a Brazilian man from Brazil’s 7-1 loss to Germany, who was hitting things with his shirt on the way out and ended up hitting one of the bartenders in the face.
In general, the Brazilians were not the best-liked supporters. While they did show up in the biggest numbers, they were also the most rowdy, and not always in a good way. In contrast, the bartenders’ favorite fans were those who supported the Brazilians’ third-place opponents - the Dutch. Whenever the Oranje played, orange filled the bar, along with scarves and feather boas everywhere (the one talking to me told me that there would be orange feathers everywhere for days after a Dutch game).
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