Good
My first experience of the new stadium last night and I was well impressed. I am in the Ninian stand at the corner with the North Stand and was a little concerned beforehand about what the view would be like - I needn't have worried, it was fine, my seat was comfortable and there was plenty of leg room (I'd still prefer to stand though given the choice).
Maybe others think differently, but the ground felt like home straight away for me and although the atmosphere wasn't fantastic (when is it for pre season matches?), I was encouraged by the fact that it sounded not bad at all in there when people did get behind the team. I'll not miss Ninian Park much at all because it was well past it's sell by date but it was a very atmospheric stadium - hopefully we can also make our new stadium have that great feeling that you got at Ninian Park when it felt like the whole ground was right behind the team as they sang songs of support.
I went for a wander around at half time and couldn't help but feel proud of what I was seeing. We now have facilities to match those of so many of the clubs that have been considered "bigger" than us for years - with our new training facilities as well, there is no longer any justification in feeling inferior to the sides we will playing week in week out.
One last thing - I am not a programme buyer normally, but, even at a fiver each, I thought last night's was very good and decent value for money.
Bad
It's been said by many already, but why bother with the "Stand up if you hate Swansea" stuff? In my opinion our support is most impressive when it is doing that - supporting that is!
The tannoy system was worse than useless where I was sat and they may as well have not bothered with it for all the use it was - invariably, you could understand the first few words that were said, but then Norman Collier would take over and the rest was totally incomprehensible (judging by the announcements of substitutions, I take it that both sides had a lot of Polish and Chinese trialists on the bench last night?)! We were told after the Chasetown match that this problem would be sorted out, but it certainly wasn't last night and so you have to wonder if it ever will.
Weren't we also told that the big screen would be in place for the Celtic match and where were the state of the art televisions that we were all supposed to be able to watch before and after the game and at half time?
I am not going to get too worked up about things going wrong yet though because the "real" first match as far as I am concerned takes place on 8 August - hopefully the tannoy system will be sorted out by then and the televisions and big screen will be in place.
Indifferent
I am including the catering facilities in this category rather than the bad only because, apart from perhaps the very occasional pre match pint, I just won't be using them.
I can recognise the need to make a profit, I also understand that, to some extent, Compass have a captive audience and they deserve a little credit for reducing some (and I emphasise the word "some") of their prices. However, the simple fact is that much of the stuff they are selling can be purchased for less than half of the price they are charging about a hundred yards away in the new Asdas, Marks and Spencer, Subway, Costco etc. and, often, the quality is better! Sorry, but no amount of transatlantic bollox about the "match day experience at our new facility" will persuade me to line the pockets of the catering company that is trying to fleece us dry as they cash in on our loyalty!
The game comes under the indifferent heading for me as well. It was your usual pre season fare really. I suppose it was a bit more entertaining than the norm for such matches (or did I feel that because it was an "occasion"?), but it was pretty tame stuff really - the respective managers will probably take heart from stuff like fitness levels but those who always stay away from pre season games didn't miss much really.
It was pretty depressing mind to see the same old faces in our midfield and, yet again, I thought we came off second best in that department. Parry and Whittingham showed more appetite for work than they did for much of last season, but never really achieved much. However, our main problem, especially in the early stages, was in central midfield. Joe Ledley wasn't anywhere near his best and, for me at least, played too deep, but the main problem as I saw it was that our "playmaker" didn't play! I tried to defend Steve McPhail against his critics at times last season, but in the end I had to concede that he was just not delivering and last night offered no evidence at all that things will be different this season.
Celtic were walking through our midfield in the first twenty minutes when they could easily have put the game beyond us. Thankfully though, one of our new signings David Marshall produced some fine saves to keep them out and with Gyepes and the impressive Gerrard sticking to their tasks well, Celtic were never again as dangerous as they had been in the opening stages.
Our other new signing on show last night did pretty well - Quinn didn't do anything that was eye catching, but looked pretty solid while on the other flank, Tony Capaldi offered us far more going forward than Kevin McNaughton (who offers more defensive solidity than Capaldi) was doing before his injury.
Jay Bothroyd picked up the sponsors man of the match award and I wouldn't quibble too much about that because he again showed that he is going to be a focal point (perhaps too much of a focal point?) of our play. However, I thought our best player was Chris Burke, who replaced Paul Parry at half time. I thought we shaded the second half and much of that was down to Burke's ability to make progress down the right in a way that Parry never did - Burke always impresses me when he plays for us and I hope we make more use of him this season than we did last.