Saturday, July 29, 2017
Night At The Opera v Never Mind The Bollocks
Ok you may be looking at the title of this post, I mean what do a couple of album titles from the 1970s have to do with Indonesian football, and wondering whether I have finally lost my last few marbles but bear with me.
After spending a couple of days in Yogyakarta I flew back to Jakarta taking in the mountain peaks that form the spine of this incredible island contemplating the two football matches I had witnessed. PSS v Persibangga and PSIM v Persatu in Liga 2. I wasn't alone, more than 35,000 I guess watched both games including some Europeans who had heard about the PSS fans, Brigata Curva Sud, and had come to see what the fuss was all about.
This was my fourth visit this year to the impressive Maguwoharjo International Stadium deep in the heart of residential Sleman on the outskirts of Yogyakarta and I still had no idea of the way. It didn't matter. This time I teamed up with a couple of Germans in town to film a documentary about the Sleman fans and we headed to the base camp of BCS, a small shophouse stocked with t shirts and other memorabilia complete with a computerised stock taking system.
The BCS are slowly being noticed by more genuine football supporters around the world for their creative terrace displays during games with more and more fans visiting to taste the atmosphere for themselves and as well as myself and the two Germans there were at least three other foreigners at the game; to put that in context that is probably the most I have seen at a single game for about seven years!
We arrived good and early at the stadium and were able to park up right outside the main entrance of the main stand. Shortly after arriving a convoy of US military style jeeps made its own entrance into the car park with people in the back waving large green, white and black flags. Jeeps I tell you!
By the time I entered the stadium the famous South Terrace, the BCS, was filling up nicely and everyone was waiting for the show to begin. When I say show I do mean show. Oh, and there was a football match as well.
The BCS are fairly new to the scene only being formed back in 2010/2011 by disgruntled Slemania fans. The first times I had seen PSS I was only aware of the Slemania, indeed I still have one of their scarves, and even then they were capable of showing incredible loyalty and passion for their unfancied football club. I first noticed them in 2012 when I took a visiting Australian pal to see them play Persipasi when both teams were in the second division, known as Divisi Utama. PSS had a sizeable following up from Yogyakarta making a sizeable noise.
Since then the BCS legend has grown beyond belief. Slemania are still there, on the north terrace, and while they may lack the numbers of their peers down the opposite end of the stadium they still have that same Sleman noise and passion. But all eyes are on the BCS and what they will do. This season we have seen them do 4D corea at some games; whatever they do is likely to be memorable and creative and it was about this time, as I settled down to watch them play Persibangga and kick off approach, I started to feel there were elements of those stadium bands from the 1970s for whom the show was as much a part of the event as anything else.
A hidden signal from the South Terrace and throats were cleared, drums tested for sound and away they went with their rhythmic sound filling the early evening air. Imagine there was a roof on that terrace! They kept up the drumming, singing, chanting, flag-waving and swaying for the first 45 minutes and I was knackered just watching them. It was strangely hypnotic seeing this vast terrace move as one and you could not but wonder at the organisation that goes in to their displays. And their chants have depth, many feature a verse followed by a chorus when the flags are raised before they are lowered as we enter a second verse.
It was like watching a band like Queen or Pink Floyd performing at a large arena such was the attention to detail and the way they held the rest of the stadium in the palm of their hand. The game started with the supporters serenading the players, ended with a serenade and in between went through the supporters song book seemingly without pause and never once did the intensity drop though there were times when some of the flags drooped when they shouldn't have but hey, they were big buggers.
Look carefully and you could see some spectators standing on the pitch side of the fencing with a PSS scarf acting as a kind of safety belt. What that was all about I have no idea but when I posted an image on Instagram some lad was quick to spot his girlfriend!
Down the other end the Slemania weren't the overawed support band you might have expected. They made their own din all game giving the stadium a wonderful stereo sound system. At half time the Slemania were busy organising their own display, a Palestinian flag to be shown in the second half in support of the Palestinians in Jersusalem and the problems they were having accessing the Al Aqsa Mosque, one of the holiest sites in Islam. After a few practise efforts they were ready to go and into the second half they were ready to show support for their Muslim brothers, earning appreciative cheers and applause from the rest of the crowd.
The whole Ultra thing has never really appealled to me, it's roots are Italian I think and in England we have never felt the need to get so organised but when it works it does look bloody impressive and Indonesia can be proud of the Brigata Curva Sud who are doing their bit to show local football in a positive light.
From the opera to the 100 Club. Where flag waving PSS fans arrived at Maguwoharjo Stadium in jeeps, flag waving PSIM fans in small convoys pedalled furiously south along Jalan Imogiri Barat. I of course took the easy way and hired a taxi for the short journey to the Sultan Agung Stadium, nominally the home of Persiba Bantul but for now also being used by PSIM while their Mandala Krida Stadium is being renovated.
I arrived at the 35,000 capacity stadium set slightly off the main road and situated next to a horse racing track and a velodrome around 30 minutes before kick off. At a similar time the previous night Maguwoharjo Stadium was a heaving mass of green and white humanity. Here things were less quiet, understandable give the 3pm kick off may be good for the TV companies but is less convenient for match going fans at work and school.
I teamed up with Pak Sejarah, in his hooped shirt and curly hair he looked like he had been auditioning for the role of Ronald McDonald. I was introduced to some Brajamusti lads, and a representative from the Persatu who told me their supporters had travelled eight hours to reach Yogyakarta!
With minutes to go to the kick off the stadium was still mostly empty and the swathes of spaces on the terraces didn't look to impressive for the TV viewer but as the first half wore on more and more fans took their place. Like PSS, PSIM have two main supporter groups, Brajamusti and Maident with the former by far the larger. But within the Brajamusti there are different grouping based on their home village, musical taste or dress sense. In the block next to me for example there was a group of casuals wearing the branded clothes their English peers used to a generation and a half ago.
With more and more supporters entering the stadium the decibel counter got higher but the noise was never as sustained as the PSS din. The songs would start, echo round the stadium then die a natural death. Think Ramones songs fading at the end. The PSIM fans were more interested in doing their own thing and different parts of the stadium would break out in song at different times, stopping before the rest of the ground could join in. While this was going on other fans were milling round on the track that separated the terraces from the pitch again just doing their own thing including posing for selfies. No one seemed to worried least of all the security officials who seemed content to let the supporters do their own thing. When there was some terrace angst three or four security guys in hi vis jackets soon had t hings under control and for the most part the fans did a good job of policing themselves.
Fans quite happily climbed over the fences in the main stand that ostensibly separated VVIP from VIP and the security personnel didn't seem too bothered. Indeed at one point a lad climbed the fence,walked by a security guy, opened a small gate and climbed down on to the track behind the dug outs, picked up a shoe and returned from whence he had come with not a word exchanged with the said man in uniform. It was all terribly punk with fans pushing the envelope but knowing instinctively how far to push.
For all the discipline of Sleman, the PSIM game was like going to a punk concert. The fans did what they wanted, sang when they wanted and went where they wanted. It might have looked a bit intimidating but it looked like the security did have an idea who they were dealing with and were happy to give them some slack while everyone knew where the red line was.
One city, two teams, two very different fan experiences. As you might expect there is very little love lost between the rival sets of supporters as recent incidents have highlighted and were they to meet in a competitive game the choice of venue would be interesting. Yogyakarta is famous for a good many things but for me at least as a football city it takes some beating.
# posted by Me @ 12:03 PM 
