"Latvia, sara, sara, sarauj!" sounded in the Prague´s underground. Not all of the Latvians had tickets - they were hunting for them just before the game. All Latvian fans have belonged to the best ones for a long time. They are rowdy and devoted. During the Friday, there were hundreds of them, on Saturday thousands.
„We made a queue on the country borders with our buses," said 25-yrs-old Lauris from Riga. Half proud, half steamed-up. He had no chance to get the ticket at home. „It didn´t work via the internet and our ice-hockey association didn´t get any tickets,“ he complains.
Almost all Latvian fans came to Prague like that too. Without the ticket. They came in the game day and they had to do two things: get the tickets and prepare themselves. They bought their tickets from German fans, who had the ticket packets but didn´t want to see other game than the night Germany vs. Kazakhstan. Lauris´ friend bought the ticket for 40 EURO. „It´s quite good, I saw tickets that cost 200 EURO,“ said Piiter.
He has belonged to the most devoted fans of the Latvian national team for a really long time. As well as many of his fellow countrymen. In Finland last year, the Latvians were the most numerous fans from abroad all around. Irbe, Naumovs, Kerčs... Those names were the most common. Three hours before the game, the Latvians filled up the Fun Village, a huge tent built next to the Sazka Arena. The beer and the meat-sausage is sold there, the music band plays the whole time. But the right show started there, in the Sazka Arena. In non-smoking area on the ice.