As David Moyes and his players prepare for arguably West Ham United’s biggest match in a generation, supporters are relishing the opportunity to continue following the Irons on a European tour.
With the UEFA Europa League semi-final second leg set to take place on Thursday evening away to Eintracht Frankfurt, the Claret and Blue Army have made their own travel arrangements to ensure their support for the team is heard inside the Frankfurt Waldstadion.
While the Hammers may be 2-1 down from the first leg at London Stadium, there is a true belief among the West Ham faithful that, much like in Lyon, the side can claim a historic away victory and progress to the Final in Seville.
We spoke to several groups of supporters in Frankfurt who are set to attend Thursday’s historic fixture.
Paul, Kim, Bobby, George & Mark
Kim: We’ve all come out together for Thursday’s game. We flew from Manchester into Cologne on Wednesday and stayed there overnight, and got the train into Frankfurt this morning.
We’re really enjoying the trip to Germany. Paul and Mark have been going to West Ham games together for almost 30 years and we met because we both travel from up north into King’s Cross for the matches.
Paul and I met when I moved up to York, and both worked in a supermarket together. He heard my accent and asked which team I support, to which I said West Ham, so we became friends. After 30 years of being friends and going to games together, we got married!
We all travel down to West Ham games all the time. Our days off are trips out to watch West Ham with the family. We’ll get back home early Thursday morning and then it’s back out on Sunday to the Norwich City game!
This European tour has been incredible. It’s so great to see West Ham in Europe again. We don’t want it to end. Sevilla away was a really memorable trip. The people there were lovely and it was a fantastic atmosphere. The locals were so welcoming, so we’re really hoping we get to go there again!
We’ve all got different score predictions for tonight but we’re in agreement that West Ham will go through. George thinks we’ll go through in extra-time!
Steven
I was actually down in Devon for the week, playing golf, and it happened to clash with this huge European game. I got in the car at midnight on Thursday morning and I’ve driven my way down here to Frankfurt! It was a tiring drive but I got here okay!
I’ve been a West Ham fan my whole life. This isn’t my first European away match. I was also in Belgium for the away game with KRC Genk and also got to be in Seville and Lyon, in the round of 16 and the quarter-finals.
The Lyon away game was special. It obviously wasn’t amazing to be kept in the stadium for so long after, but it was very special when the players and David Moyes came out to salute us and thank us for our support. That was very cool.
We’re obviously all hoping for one more away trip after this one too – a return to Seville would be great!
Michael & Michael
We’re two Michaels but we’re not related! We’re mates through West Ham. We’re both in the away game system and that’s how we met.
We live in different parts of England so we’ve both travelled separately to Heathrow, before getting a flight over. We got here at about 11pm on Wednesday night but we weren’t out too late. We were both tired so it was straight to bed before coming to get our tickets.
We’ve been to every European away game we’ve been permitted to attend this season. It’s been a fun tour, and Lyon away really sticks out to us. It was mad and we loved it.
It was a great night and we’re hoping for another great night against Frankfurt!
