Braehead Clan

A few weeks ago we were invited to go along to the Braehead Arena to watch the Braehead Clan ice-hockey team take on the mighty Dundee Stars.

None of us had been to a hockey match before and so were not sure what to expect but I've got to say we throughly enjoyed all of it.

I think what first struck us first was just how professional the whole set up is. For some reason I'd imagined a really basic ammature side watch by a hundred people, but the whole event was really slickly put together. As we stepped out the car park lift we were greeted by hundreds of people milling around, purchasing beer (you can drink at ice hockey matches), bags of sweets and hotdogs or buying offical glossy programmes or other "Clan" related merchandise. In fact it was pretty impressive how many people were wearing the team colours, sweatshirts and hockey shirts. Given that this is a realatively new team they seen to have quite quickly gather a loyal following.

We collected out tickets, purchased a few bags of tangy haribo and took our seats looking through the thickglass which surrounds the rink and trying to work out what all the markings on the ice mean and why the goals were so small.

I'm a football fan and I think I was being a bit snobish at the start about this "North American" sport. When the funny music started up at the beginning and the four small cheerleaders started doing their moves high at the back of one of the stands I thought oh boy here we go. I've always imagined american sports basketball, baseball, american football - more about the things going on around the game rather than about the game itself but then the teams were on the pitch and the action started and I quickly forgot everything I'd just said.

American Sports seem to fall into two catergories - "the slow" (with repeated stoppages) ie baseball and american football, which seem to last several weeks and "the crazy fast" (with repeated stoppages) ie basketball. Icehockey falls firmly into this second categoery and within seconds of the start we'd been to both ends of the rink, there'd been a shot on goal and a guy had been tripped, with the puck moving so fast you could easily loose track if you blinked for too long.

The Dundee Stars quickly put the local lads underpressure and from the chants around about us I realised that the small group of people on the other side of the aisle from us were the Dundee fans. It really is a family atmosphere, there were hundreds of children chanting and dancing at their seats and no real annomosity between the two different groups of fans even after the Dundee Stars took an early lead and their fans started banging a big drum.

We will have to read up on our rules before next time as it took us a while to work out what was going on but with some pretty impressive skating and some even more impressive shooting Braehead started their comeback. The first period ended 1 all and we went out to buy some more sweets and discovered lots of staff wandering around with giant beer and cider dispensing machines on their backs like alcoholic Ghostbusters. was quite impressive and made me wander what other events could benefit from their attendance.

In the second period the "Clan" took the lead and in the third they gave the Dundee Stars a going over with the score ending an impressive 6 - 1 to the home side. Second in excitement to the attempts on the goals were the attempts by the players on their opponents lives with cheeky little trips, blatent whacks and the occaisonal punchup breaking up the play and seeing the culprits stuck in the sin bin for two minutes. These repeated breaks mean that the game is actually on for a lot longer than the adveertised lengther of the three periods combined but they add a strange cathartic fun to the proceedings and possibly are the reason the fans all get on so well.

All in all I'd say we had a really good night out, the game was fast, infectious and fun. The event itself was slickly professional with lots of Scottish tweaks on American traditions. The fans were all in good spirit, singing and bouncing around, all dressed up in the team colours. It was all a lot of fun and I'd highly reccomend to give it a try especially those with kids who will probably really enjoy the fast paced action.

"Come on the Clan."

Visit here for more info on the team and their upcoming games. http://www.braeheadclan.com/.