Solo trip: Udine, Italy

A lot of people I’ve met in the United Kingdom have asked me why I moved to the UK, and my trip to Udine, Italy, is one of the reasons why.

Wednesday 13th August 2025. Tottenham Hotspur vs Paris Saint-Germain (PSG). 2025 UEFA Super Cup final.

I travelled 12 hours to attend this football match by myself. As a long-time Tottenham supporter of over 17 years from Aotearoa/New Zealand. It was such a surreal moment, but let’s go back to the day before.

5 am wake up, get ready to catch my bus from Chiddingfold, Surrey. 45-minute bus ride to Guildford, waiting for my train to Gatwick Airport. Another 40minutes to the airport, where I’ll be shortly catching my 9 am flight to Milan, Italy, which is £127 (NZD 285) for a return flight. I arrive in Milan, 11am-ish, but it doesn’t stop there. I need to catch a train to Milan Centrale (main train station in Milan), which is (you guessed it) another 40-minute train ride. Arriving in Milan, I have about 10minutes to grab some food, £9 later for a hefty provolone and prosciutto stuffed focaccia, I’m on a train to Verona leaving at 2:25 pm. 2 hours later, I’m on another train to Venezia (Venice). 2 and a half hours later, and I’ve made it. Shattered from my 12-hour journey, I head straight to my hostel. Anda Venice Hostel. I will go on record by saying it is by far the best hostel I have stayed in. Cost me £36.58 (NZD 83.62) for two nights, in a shared 6-bed mixed dorm. You can definitely find cheaper accommodation, but if you want cheap QUALITY accommodation, quality being the highlighted word, then Anda is your best bet in Venice, Italy. The time it took to get here was ridiculous, but worth it, and let me tell you why.

I am a huge Tottenham Hotspur supporter. If you don’t know about my obsession, see this article here. After the hype had died down from our UEFA Europa League triumph, I knew I had to try to attend the UEFA Super Cup final, which is played by the winners of the Europa League and Champions League, a huge game against the best team in the world. The odds were against Tottenham from the get-go; everyone was saying we’d get rolled over, but we gave a worthwhile performance that I’ll always remember. The day, however, started with a much-needed buffet breakfast, provided by my hostel for £7.50 (depending on the exchange rate), and then I had to catch my train at 12:15 pm.

There were so many fans catching the train, from both Tottenham and PSG, and already I was getting excited. After an hour and 40 minutes, I’d arrived in Udine, and as soon as I got off the train, I knew I had to stick to my crowd. Police were lined up at the train station, and game ambassadors were there, ushering fans to their respective shuttle buses. I opted to walk the streets of Udine before going to the Tottenham fan zone hosted at the Piazza Primo Maggio. Udine struck me as a very traditional but modern Italian town, not a lot of touristy type shops, but a lot of beautiful things to see. After 15 minutes, I arrived at the Fan Zone.

Everywhere I looked, there were Tottenham shirts. Fans of the football club I love in a town in Italy. I knew I was among my people; there were bars set up, food stalls, and even a stage for live entertainment, which included an appearance by the parents of Udine native and Tottenham Hotspur goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario. The atmosphere was amazing, even though it was 35 degrees, so to cool off, I embraced English culture by buying a few pints and treating myself to some fried calamari, which set me back about £20 (NZD 46). Then the live music started, and it wasn’t your usual songs being performed, no, but it was Tottenham songs being sung, and that may sound a bit cheesy, but I guarantee you every person in that crowd knew all the words and that is one of the things I love about football and being a supporter of Tottenham Hotspur. Sharing a passion with people who feel the same way is a feeling that cannot be described unless you support a sports team yourself. I was at the fanzone all day until it was time to head to the stadium, and thank god, free shuttle buses were taking us there. 10 minutes later, we arrived at Stadio Friuli, a 22,000-capacity stadium home to Italian Serie A side Udinese.

The shuttle buses dropped us off where Tottenham supporters should enter for obvious reasons, but I looked at my ticket, £100 (NZD 231) it cost me, and my gate number wasn’t the same as other fans. Turns out the ticket I bought had me seated in the other end, with the fans of Paris Saint-Germain. So naturally, I’m bricking it because I’m in my Tottenham jersey, luckily, I bought a button-up shirt, so I quickly put that on, and boy was I glad to have that on. The closer I got to my gate, the more PSG shirts I noticed, and in the distance, I could hear a group of PSG fans chanting, the sound of drums, and I knew the PSG ultras were close. So as I was going through the entry points, I quickly rushed through, raced to the bathroom, took off my Spurs shirt and put my button-up on because it was also really hot, so I didn’t want to have that on underneath. I went to find my seat, and I was definitely amongst PSG supporters.

There were flags on every seat, the section was blocked off by thick plastic walls, and once the game started, the PSG ultras did not stop chanting or singing. Not gonna lie, as intimidated as I was, I couldn’t help but admire the passion, and I think that added to my experience attending the game because the majority of fans in my area did not sit down, they were either singing, jumping or animating in some way, and I look over to the opposite side of the stadium, to the Tottenham fans and majority of them were sitting down and I’m not trying to say, “oh these fans were more passionate than our fans”, but it was just an insane viewing experience for the game. To be honest, I would love to attend a PSG game if a couple of thousand PSG fans were like this; imagine what the Parc des Princes (PSG's home stadium) is like. Unfortunately, my beloved Tottenham lost the game after leading 2-0 up until the 85th minute, which is really annoying as PSG came back to equalise in the 94th minute, but that also showed why they’re the best team in the world, and Tottenham have a long way to go.

The end of the game was wild. Thousands of Spurs supporters hustled to reach the pick-up point for the shuttle buses to take us back to the fanzone, but there were so many people that it was like it would be impossible to get on a bus when it came. So, I managed to eavesdrop on some conversations, and I overheard there were shuttles a few minutes away in a different pick-up location, taking Spurs fans back to the train station, which was a much better option for me, as I had to catch the 12:45 am train back to Venice, but if I was able to make that shuttle I could catch the earlier train at 12:15 am. Lo and behold, I made the shuttle and even got a seat. 10 minutes later, I made it to the train station, with a few minutes to spare, but then I saw the Police and metro workers blocking the entrance and won’t let people through without a ticket, thank god I pre-booked, so I flashed my ticket and made it to the train. Tired from the day/night, it took me 2 and a half hours to get back to my hostel. I got back at 2:40 am, and by the time I got back to my room, I was shattered. I’d finally made it back, but now it was time to get some much-needed rest before I had to make another 12-hour trip back home to Chiddingfold, Surrey.

I’ll spare you the details of my 12-hour journey back, but by the time I arrived back home, it was around 10:20ish pm. Am I crazy to go through all this for a football game? A total of nearly 30 hours of travelling, a game that my team lost, a game where I sat with fans of the opposite team, in the heat that was an average of 30 plus degrees, costing me well over £400. Maybe. But guess what? I did it. I got to experience all this in its entirety, and it’s an experience I will always remember because that is part of the reason I’m over this side of the world. To create memories and experiences that will stay with me forever. The real question is, would I do it all over again? You bet your sweet bippy I would.