Got a ticket in the away end c/o Stoke City. Visited the stadium early. It''s huge, with 2 bridges over to it and a load of statues, including Adams and Henri. It was like a smaller version of Wembley. Then went to the Twelve Pins pub to watch the QPR v Forest match. Had a great chat with a QPR fan called Kieron - nice lad - and watched Forest win 2 1. The rest of the pub was watching Everton beat Chelsea 3 1 and cheering every Everton goal. Then to the Emirates for the match. Stoke were poor and completely outclassed. The talent on display was amazing - Walcott, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Giroud, Shaquiri, Bojan, Alexis Sanchez, Peter Czech, Muniesa, Ramsay, Ozil, the list goes on and on - hundreds of millions of pounds on the pitch. Very impressed by the stadium with it''s banners (incl gaygooners.com) and it''s padded seats. Liked the gunnersaurus mascot too. But not so impressed with the Arsenal fans - it really is a Library. The Stoke fans were pretty good with various songs incl Delilah, a La Bamba version of Mark Muniesa, p1ss takes of Wenger and an ironic song about London being a sh1thole! But there was a nasty feel to it at times - The national anthem, eng-er-land and town full of isis all being sung too. I didn''t like the nationalistic, made in England undercurrent. But as the Stoke song went, at least they support their local team! BEFORE: Not the Emirates but I went to Highbury years ago with Steve O''Riordan. FA Cup, won 3 1 (I think), Brian Rice scored, the Arsenal fans coined us and someone let a firehose off in the tunnel beneath the terrace - happy days!

Ticket price - free as NRM gave me his season ticket. (Holloway tube then a short walk. What a fantastic stadium! Everything was quality, the seats were padded, more than enough leg room, great sight lines and even the toilets were quality! The one down side were the prices at the kiosks, outrageous! Great game from an Arsenal perspective who completely outplayed Stoke who were very poor. For a gate of nearly 60,000 the atmosphere could have been better. Missed Arsenal''s second goal as was advised to leave the game early in order to avoid the usual chaos on final whistle therefore making very good time in getting home).