Opening
Accreditation is a small quest: an email, a confirmation, a list, a passport. At the end you get a PRESS card with your surname handwritten on the back in marker — in the age of Face ID and Fan ID there is something touchingly analogue about it. On the reverse are the stadium zones from zero to nine; the press get three: the grounds, the stands and the press centre with its box. The digits 0, 7 and 9 on the card are your route for the evening.
Then come the corridors and the journalists' working room: desks, sockets, wi-fi. Half the people are charging equipment, the other half are already writing and watching, even though kick-off is an hour and a half away. People say hello and chat, but quietly, almost like a reading room — you can feel everyone saving their words for the evening.
