by jgr80
A few days ago I blogged a rather cynical remark about Canadian fans at the hockey games. Here's some pictures from the Canada vs Norway quarter final game. The last game Team Canada was to play in Halifax.
I took these pictures during gameplay in the first period. EDIT: I was told that five or so minutes into the game, the Metro Centre or the IIHF or TSN or someone of such power made the decision to give tickets away. Thousands of them. Meaning barely anyone bought tickets to see the game in the first place.
Many of the international fans that were going to every game-- lots of Latvians, gaggles of Germans, a slew of Slovenians, for example-- had left the city to go back home. Each game had a few hundred of these folks.
And sure, the game was on a Monday during a regular day's work schedule. I spoke to a lot of people who were taking work off to go to the game though.
It's funny that when an event of this caliber comes to Canada - the first nation of hockey - and our team is playing, we can't fill a 9000 seat stadium.
This comes from a so-called "hockey crazed" city that begs for huge events, especially concerts, to come to them every summer-- fighting it out with the other cities in the region, creating unnecessary rivalries about municipal governments. If I were a promoter looking in the stands at this event, I wouldn't be thinking of lots of people coming out to The Commons to see Celine Dion or The Eagles.
Once they did get a few more bums in the seats, the fans were pretty good. They cheered and jeered as one would expect.
At the end of the game, Team Canada - as they had throughout the tournament - thanked the fans. They thanked a little longer this time, as it was their last game in Halifax. Overall, the fans were pretty good when the team needed them. There was a big penalty kill against the USA --lasting nearly 6 minutes-- that would have been real tough for the Canadians to kill without the fans.
The biggest thing about the fans for me, was that they were so negative about everything compared to international fans. The international fans cheered their team no matter if they were winning or losing. The Canadian fans didn't cheer for their team so much as they booed the refs and booed other teams.
As you can see, the stands filled up a bit more by the end of the game.
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