Cardiff and the Rugby World Cup

I'm not known on here for my posts of a purely positive nature!

I was in Cardiff yesterday and the numbers far exceeded a "normal" six nations game. How many Irish were there?
Which made my think, what a great job Cardiff does in hosting these huge events. What an amazing atmosphere and the weather played its part too.

The whole place comes to a standstill and it hard to think of anywhere else, where just about everyone in a city is there just for one purpose. (Mardi-Gras in Rio?)
The policing is very well planned and relaxed, walking past the queueing sections outside the station and the people waiting, drinking beer from plastic cups. Can you imagine this in London or Manchester? Take one step onto the pavement with alcohol and you are nabbed.

Rugby Ball was a brilliant idea, lots taking photos of it and creating twitter mash ups. https://twitter.com/search?q=%23ballinthewall


I know there were problems with some trains and queues, I think far more Irish fans arrived by train from Bristol/London than GWR expected.

All in all a very good start to the tournament.

Totally agree! popped into town yesterday and today to experience great atmosphere, hopefully leaving new visitors with a great impression of the city. Mind you perhaps not, if they arrived by train or stayed in a hotel that's taking the pi**. Plenty more to come with this World Cup with some pretty big games especially those quarter finals - it'll be interesting to see wednesdays crowd for australia v fiji. At least new visitors can see that our 'retro' bus station is an area where some exciting developments are underway.

The fanzone has attracted over 30k already. Big test will be Wednesday PM game though Freshers Week may help with numbers!