The Ultimate Sports Wife and I landed at London’s Heathrow airport at 6:30 am. With a 13-hour layover before our 8 pm flight to Athens, Greece, I had already planned to attend the Arsenal and Aston Villa match at Emirates Stadium Saturday afternoon – kickoff was set for 3 pm.

Our friend, British Mick, had made all the plans for the day. He insisted on picking us up from Heathrow at 7:30 am (which was definitely a good decision) and drive us back to his place. From there we were to nap, shower and be ready to depart by 11:30 am in order to meet the “Arsenal boys” for lunch by noon.

We met Mick’s friends at the Cock Tavern – a pub directly next to the Highbury & Islington tube stop. We grabbed a drink at the pub before continuing to Gem Restaurant – a Turkish/Kurdish restaurant. Politics aside Kurdish/Turkish food should be read as Greek/Turkish food. Nicole and I laughed at the irony that we were dining at a Kurdish (read Greek) restaurant in London before flying to Athens for over a weeks visit. Nonetheless, after a few bottles of cava and wine I was ready for the match.

As we walked to Emirates Stadium, I asked one of the “Arsenal boys,” who we will call “Hospitality Jim,” how much I owed him for the ticket. He said I owed nothing and that they were corporate tickets. I was shocked and offered to buy him beers inside the stadium, which he agreed. Then, he handed me his season ticket card for entry to the stadium.

Note: The season ticket card looks and acts much like a driver’s license or credit card. Many European soccer clubs sell season ticket cards rather than individual tickets to season ticket holders. There are multiple reasons to do so:

1) It cuts down on secondary ticket market sales since the season ticket holder needs to invite a friend or walk the buyers of the ticket to the stadium themselves.
2) It must save on ticket cost since the club only needs to pay for one credit card per season ticket rather than the paper stock to create 10 (NFL), 45 (NBA and NHL), or 81 (MLB) tickets per season ticket.
3) It allows for easier transactions of tickets amongst season ticket holders. “Hospitality Jim” explained that if a friend has extra tickets and wants to sell them to you, Arsenal will transfer those tickets to the buyer minus a 10% commission.

In my personal opinion, it sounds like Arsenal wants to avoid the secondary ticket market and ensure they know who is entering the building. Arsenal’s decision to have a season ticket card has nearly eliminated the secondary ticket market.

My first thought of receiving the season ticket card was that I would need to find a paper ticket stub. I have paper tickets for nearly every event in which I have attended. For those events that do not have tickets, like a Tour de France, I try to find a proxy such as a flyer or something that might substitute. Thus, I asked a few people in the stadium if they had paper tickets. Each scoffingly laughed and said that I would be pretty lucky to find a paper ticket. Thus, I came to the conclusion that this would be my first game without having an actual ticket stub. In the absence of a ticket, I took a picture of “Hospitality Jim’s” season ticket card. My plan is to develop the picture and use that as my ticket stub.

At halftime the game was tied 0-0. I bought “Hospitality Jim” his beer as promised. The Premiership allows fans to buy and drink beer on the concourse. However, fans cannot bring beer to their seat, which kind of encourages you to chug your beer. The second half was not good for the home team. Aston Villa scored a goal early and late in the second half to win the game 2-0.

After the game, I found the Arsenal tube stop on the Piccadilly line since I could take that line directly to Heathrow without changing. The entire journey took about an hour and 20 minutes. I arrived at Heathrow at 6:30 pm and met Nicole (since she did not have a ticket for the Arsenal match). We sleepily sat waiting at the gate and boarded the plane for Athens. This was the ultimate sports layover for a trip to Europe.