What to expect from the Etihad Stadium crowd?

The Etihad has potential for a bit of argy bargy between home and away fans. Sometimes it’s just profane language, or times attempted violence or serious slander. There’s space for 3,000 away fans in the South Stand, over all 3 tiers with very little space separating the two sides. Whatever you do, don’t react to any taunting from the home fans, as you’re the one that’s likely to be ejected.

The overall atmosphere fluctuates from game to game. Sometimes, when City aren’t playing ‘magisterially’ well, the crowd will groan or stay quiet. Fingers crossed you go on a good day!

The Etihad can suffer from the problem that all big stadiums suffer from – it can be too big. Now on important match days the stadium will be rocking, the seats will be full and the echoes of ‘Blue Moon’ will be reverberating round the acoustically perfect stadium. However high ticket prices means that some fans keep away, especially on Champions League nights, which contributes to a flat atmosphere sometimes.

The away fans are housed in the South Stand, relatively near the home supporters which means that the atmosphere here can get heated, with only a line of stewards and a few rows of seats seperating the two sets of supporters – colorful language can fill the air.