Manchester City: The Ultimate Fan Experience

One of Manchester City’s Official Partners  – Sure UK and Ireland – recently provided fans with the opportunity to win the Manchester City Ultimate Fan Experience – and one of our writers won the prize! We look at what went on behind the scenes for this stunning two days.

As a fan, what would you include in the Ultimate Manchester City Fan experience? A personal behind the scenes tour of the Etihad Stadium and City Football Academy? A presentation from the first team tactical performance analyst about an upcoming game? A chance to train with Manchester City coaches? A hospitality package for a match? How about all of that and more?

The Ultimate Manchester City fan experience included all of that and so much more because throughout you got to experience what it must be like to be rich and famous too because you were driven around Manchester in a private luxury vehicle, stayed in high class hotels and ate in the finest restaurants in Manchester such as The Ivy.

What is particularly brilliant is that the official partners – Sure UK – gave away this opportunity to Manchester City fans rather than using it for their own staff. In the modern world of football to have a partner giving back to the fans is truly to be applauded.

The Ultimate Fan experience took place over 2 days around the Shakhtar Donetsk home game and started with a private behind the scenes tour of the City Football Academy where we had the chance to get access to see Academy players in action and had presentations from the Head of Operations and Development and the Lead Academy Nutritionist.

We then transferred to the Etihad Stadium where we started with a detailed presentation from the First Team Performance Analyst, which involved showing us the information which had been presented to Pep Guardiola about the upcoming match opponents. This was a fascinating insight into the level of detail required to underpin the performances of the star players on the field.

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Afterwards we visited the Home Dressing Room and walked down to the immaculate pitch side and sat in the dug outs. As it was the eve of a Champions League match the stadium had in effect been turned over to UEFA who were busy covering the Manchester City sponsors with UEFA sponsors. Shakhtar were also there, training on the Etihad pitch in advance of the game. As we left the Stadium we were surprised to be given £100 gift cards to spend in the City Club Shop!

The evening saw us wined and dined at The Ivy before an early start the following day to the CFA where we were to train with the Manchester City coaches. Upon arrival we were confronted with the wonderful sight of our own personalised Manchester City training kit waiting for us. Pulling on the kit, made us feel almost as though we were actually players!

There was time for another surprise too, because when we entered the indoor training pitches we were introduced to ex Manchester City player Joleon Lescott who was one of the coaches! All of the coaching staff were brilliant, tailoring the session to fitness and ability.

Following an exhausting 90 minute coaching session where we learnt specifically about how they drilled space and movement, we transferred back to the City centre where we were wined and dined and taken around the National Football Museum and enjoyed the Christmas Markets and Ice Skating.

We were then collected and taken back to the Etihad Stadium where we met the first team players as they disembarked from the team coach on the Blue Carpet and then we watched the game from a hospitality suite with excellent views of the pitch!

All in all this was an astounding experience which truly lived up to it’s name. The level of support and attention we received from the Manchester City staff was fantastic.

We were very thankful to Sure to have been chosen as the recipient of this prize and urge all fans to follow the pages of the Manchester City partners  in the future because real people actually do win these competitions!