Northland's Arriane Christie tells her Rugby World Cup All Blacks vs Canada game experience

Northern Advocate

4 Oct, 2019 07:00 PM3 mins to read

Proud Northlanders William Morunga (left) and Arriane Christie felt like celebrities among the crowd on Wednesday for the All Blacks/Canada Rugby World Cup game in Oita. Photo / Supplied

The Northern Advocate's very own Rugby World Cup correspondent, Arriane Christie, attended the All Blacks vs Canada game on Wednesday at the Showa Denko Dome Oita stadium in Oita. This is what she had to say about her experience watching live.

Oita has really got in behind hosting this Rugby World Cup and there was a real buzz around town on game-day. Walking around Oita and Beppu, there were rugby jerseys everywhere. There were a lot of Canadians, but the majority of people were wearing black. Although most of the people wearing All Blacks tops were locals, they love it!

The game kicked off at 7.15pm (Japan time) but the free shuttle buses to the game started four hours earlier. We headed to the bus stop about 3.30pm and lucky we did because there was already a line to get on them.

However, the locals are super organised and efficient so the queue moved really quickly, and with the buzz in the air it really didn't feel like long before we were on the bus and on our way to the stadium.

From left, Paul Brown, Keeley Lawson, William Morunga and Arriane Christie were among tens of thousands of cheering fans on Wednesday. Photo / Supplied

Getting through the gates was actually a breeze. There were thousands of people there early with us but the bag checkers and ticket scanners were many and efficient so we strolled on through to find our seats.

And good seats they were too, on the 22-metre line and not too far back, we had a great view and plenty of time before kick-off to soak up the atmosphere.

I felt like a little bit of a celebrity after a while. So many locals wanted their photo with William and I, probably because I had my sign, and William a New Zealand flag, and a well-manicured moustache!

The game itself you would have seen or read about already. The atmosphere was relaxed and festival like. It was like everyone knew what the result was going to be and were just happy to be there.

It was clear from the noise of the anthems that most people were supporting the All Blacks, but the biggest cheers actually came when Canada got their break-aways and came close to scoring.

Everything in the stadium was immaculate and well organised. From the beer being served to you in your seat to the toilets having no queues, it was probably one of the best stadium set-ups I've seen.

The atmosphere was electric in spite of the All Blacks' dominant performance. Photo / Supplied

Getting home though was a different story. Getting 35,000 people on to buses was never going to be easy and it took us about two hours waiting in the queue before we even got on a bus.

This is where I think the Japanese organisational habits counted against them. All the buses followed one route and they would not let the passengers off until they got to the same spot we got on earlier in the day. This meant there were hundreds of buses snaked along the eight-kilometre route from the stadium to the fan zone all moving at a snail's pace.

Apart from getting home, the whole experience of our first match at the Rugby World Cup in Japan was amazing. I even got Jack Goodhue's attention at the end of the game and a photo of him holding my sign. What a legend. Bring on Namibia in Tokyo!