As some people in the UK were getting up, Manaus Airport in the Amazon Jungle was a place for dour, sleepy, souls. Not because England had lost, but because quite simply most had been awake for nearly 20 hours and had lived through the Jungle heat and had not eaten a proper meal all day.
Booking foreign travel is mostly an exciting experience as adventure is on the horizon, but being in Brazil, until we got the plane tickets in our hands there is always an edge of worry when we change city.
It was nice of David Luiz to welcome us to the airport, though he was rather still and did not say much either. My picture of the day before I have even got to the stadium was probably this! A welcome football matt before you entered on to the plane…. I wonder if they will notice if it goes missing 🙂
Upon arriving in Rio, I saw another ingenious marketing idea – using a goalpost for the entrance of the bags in the airport.
And so back to the Maracana Stadium
They have improved the lights since last year. Good news for all!
The Argentina manager used to play for Sheffield Untied.
The noise was incredible. If it is true what they are saying about the Brazilian crowds – in that they are not the normal fans who attend the likes of Flamengo, Vasco and Botafogo week in week out as they have been priced out of the World Cup – it was not the same for Argentina.
Colourful, innovative and passionate – and with no vuvuzelas, this is fast becoming a better experience in the stadiums compared to South Africa at least.
Even the most anti-FIFA journalist would not subscribe to the face that FIFA were making it hard for Argentina by making them play two teams today – Bosnia and Herzegovina.
With Bosnia playing in their first ever FIFA World Cup, it was important to get some images with some historical value.
I was fearful that Argentina would be wearing their second kit as would Bosnia and Bosnia and Herzegovina so when I saw them in their famous light blue and white stripes I made the most of the opportunity by following Messi as much as I could.
When you follow just him for 30 minutes, it is amazing how much he stands still and does absolutely nothing….
But then bursts into action when the ball is at his feet. I was not at the end where he magically celebrated his wonderful goal – hopefully he will score a few more before it’s time to go home.
One month today will be the Final!
Today was about taking nice pictures with no pressure and just filling the AMA library with all kinds of images.
Still lots of people are crying out for images of the referee spraying the white line on the pitch to indicate where the wall goes, sitting on the side of the pitch today, I got another angle of it.
After the game it was not nice to see another photographer react when he discovered that his bag had been emptied of all his belongings in the media center. I’m not really a compassionate person but I really felt for him and am so hoping that it does not happen to me.
Being tired, I just kept everything I owed very close by as myself and colleagues thought of plans to trap these evil thieves in the media centre.
Not being able to concentrate after the game, we got a cab back to our abode in Rio and a 14 hr sleep helped when it came to edit the opening game at the Maracana the next day.
Ideally I would have been shooting the USA but it was logistically impossible to get back for Tuesday’s encounter.
If you call being stuck at the computer for 5 hours after a 14 hour sleep then it was a welcome ‘day off”
Football Photographer Blog by Matthew Ashton 