Until 20 or so years ago Albania was almost closed off from the rest of the World. Their dictatorship was so repressive that they broke off ties with USSR and China for being too progressive. That and the country’s cult worship of Norman Wisdom made this a particularly intriguing place to visit.

Our party of 9 is led by Dennis Woods who is completing the noble feat of seeing football in every UEFA member country. British Airways flights from Gatwick to Tirana cost us about £220 and the journey takes about 3 hours, although we are delayed by an hour and a half when a suspension fault is detected and the aircraft returns to the stand for a minor repair.

Money is exchanged on arrival with a rate of about 160 Leks to £1. Fight our way through the hordes of taxi touts and get an official cab for the 17km journey to the city centre. See lots of Mercedes cars, some of which allegedly arrived via Great Britain and get to feel many of the plentiful potholes. Road junctions, particularly roundabouts, are a free for all. Hiring a car is not recommended. In hard-line communist times only about 500 senior party officials even had cars and streetlights are a fairly recent innovation here.

Albania is bordered by Macedonia, Kosovo, Greece and the Adriatic Sea. The country fought Turkish supremacy until the early 20^th century and were under Enver Hoxha’s strict regime from 1945 to 1985. Albania became the last country in Europe to hold free elections in 1991, but endured a turbulent start to democracy. In 1997 collapse of pyramid banking schemes brought the country to the brink of civil war. Since then, political stability and economic prosperity have improved, but poverty is still much in evidence.

It is a very secular country. 70% are Muslim, but for most people there is only a nominal attachment to a religion. Italian and Greek are spoken fairly widely, but not a great deal of English. Have to be careful to send out the right signs, as shaking your head means yes and raising of the eyebrows accompanied by a clicking noise made with the tongue, indicates no. According to ‘Top Gear’ the English words ‘car’ and ‘peach’ translate as names for the male and female genitalia in Albanian. We do not put this knowledge to the test.

Due to the flight delay we head straight to the ground, cases and all, for our Friday afternoon match.

The Quemal Stafa Stadium is a 19,600 capacity venue, located close to the city centre, by the Sheraton Hotel (not where we are staying). It is the national ground as well as home to club sides Dinamo Tirana and FK Tirana. An all seated bowl has the pitch at the centre of an athletics track. There are 2 tiers on the sides and a single tier curved round each end with only the main side under cover. We opt to splash out and pay 500 Leks (£3.10) for a seat in the main stand, although entrance on the far side was free. Programmes are not found here or at any of our other games.

The Albanian football federation and a domestic league competition commenced in 1930 and for many years, clubs from the capital dominated. In more recent times teams from other cities have made their mark. Today we see mid-table Dinamo Tirana take on 2^nd placed Skenderbeu Korce in the top division Kategoria Superiore. The crowd is estimated at 500 with many arriving during the game. With a 4.30 kick-off they presumably came straight from work.

The match is a reasonable one, albeit played at pre-season friendly pace. A burst of scoring either side of half-time puts Skenderbeu 3-1 ahead, but the biggest cheer from the visiting fans comes when it is announced that league leaders Flamurtari Vlore, one point in front of Skenderbeu, are losing. Dinamo pull back to 2-3 on the hour, but then show no interest in getting an equaliser. Some of the home fans berate the home teams lack of commitment and seem to voice match-fixing allegations. They certainly show more passion than their players. The game duly finishes 2-3.

Tirana’s main boulevard was built under Italian influence in the 1930’s. It leads to the focal point of the city, Skanderberg Square, a giant roundabout named after the 15^th century hero who briefly stemmed the Ottoman advance. His statue stands at the centre, replacing one of Enver Hoxha. The Ethem Bay Mosque, built in the 2^nd half of the 18^th century, is the oldest building on the square, most of which is a massive building site. We have to negotiate the potholes, building works and risky road crossings to get to the Hotel Nobel Tirana, our base for the weekend.

The first restaurant we try has only one item on the menu and only 8 portions of it, so rather than one person going hungry we visit the London Restaurant instead. A good meal with beer and wine costs us about £12 per head, with further drinks at several local bars to follow, beer costing about £1 for the equivalent of a pint.

Spend the Saturday morning sightseeing. The city was originally known as Teheran, which would have been confusing had they not changed it to Tirana. Founded by the Ottoman pasha Sulejman Bey in 1614, it rapidly developed into a vibrant commercial city, but did not become the country’s capital until 1920. The square mile of leafy streets known as ‘The Blloc’, was once closed to all but the party leaders and their families. It is now a chic district of bars and restaurants.

We take a look at the somewhat rundown Selman Stermasi Stadium, with capacity of 12,500, the 2^nd largest ground in Tirana. Traditionally home to FK Tirana, Albania’s most successful club with 24 league titles and where they had played on the previous day, unfortunately at the same time as Dinamo. Nowadays, most of their games are staged at the Quemal Stafa Stadium. The city’s 3^rd club Partizani were supposed to be using the Selman Stermasi ground for their 2^nd division match today but it had been switched to the Complex Kamze, which serves as the national training centre. We had been warned about late switches of times and venues and this is compounded when we hear commentary from our scheduled Sunday game on the Saturday afternoon !!

Pause for refreshment in the FK Tirana club bar and come up with a revised plan of action. Get taxis to take us to the town of Kruja, 32km north-west of Tirana, up high in the mountains, the fare coming to about £20 per cab. The taxi drivers want to take us to the castle at the top of the town and find it hard to believe that we actually want to be dropped at the football ground. The local bar is filled with a mix of football fans and police officers. Drinking on duty is obviously not an issue here. Interesting snacks, such as mini pizza biscuits and sour cherry croissants are also available.

Kruja is the home town of national hero Gjergi Kastrioti, better known as Skandersberg and it was here a little over 500 years ago that he held the Turkish forces at bay, resistance only ending upon his death. The Stadiumi Kastrioti is set on what appears to be the only piece of flat land in the area. A vast cliff rises up on one side of the 8,400 capacity ground with the land falling steeply away on the other side. It is certainly a spectacular setting. As for the ground, to say it is rundown would be a massive understatement and if in England it would have been closed down long before the Taylor Report. Wide steps of concrete terracing surround most of the ground, although it is crumbling and uneven with weeds coming through in many places. Towards one end there are large holes several feet deep, remnants of a drainage system we believe. None of the hazardous parts are closed off. The only cover is above the dressing rooms, a small area with about 30 seats and a little standing room. Entrance is free for today’s game, although some of the locals still climb walls to get in or watch from outside over the top of the wall !

KS Kastrioti Kruje take on KS Bylis Ballsh in a top division league match. Both sides are in the bottom half of the table but produce a decent feisty game far more committed than the previous days offering. Kruje edge home 2-1 with the crowd estimated at 2,150 creating a good atmosphere.

Steep uphill trudge afterwards to the top of the town, where we get a ‘fegon’ (Albanian equivalent of the Turkish dolmus) to take the 9 of us back to Tirana, the fare only being about £2.50 each including allowance for the driver’s passenger-less return trip to Kruje.

On the Sunday decide to go to Durres anyway, despite them having played on the Saturday. Durres lies on the coast 24km west of Tirana and the train journey there is an adventure in itself. The station in Tirana looks like a garage, there is a hand written timetable on the wall by the ticket office and the trains are in a field out the back. A large Czech made diesel locomotive hauls a couple of carriages where every window is riddled with stone (or bullet ?) holes. The journey takes about an hour, but a return ticket costs the princely sum of about 75 pence.

Durres was a historical port, known as Dyrrachium in Roman times. An ampitheatre, old residence of King Zog and remains of the city wall are among the tourist attractions, but we head straight for the 12,040 capacity Stadiumi Niko Dovana. Get to see the main ground at least and have the bonus of a youth game being played on the 3G pitch outside. Spectators stand outside the caged enclosure with elevated views to be had from the grass and earth bank that rises up along one side. More adventurous supporters climb up a fence to reach a concrete platform that is part of the back of the stand for the main stadium. The under 19 sides of Teuta Durres, the local league club and Shkendia Durres, an academy set-up, play a decent game in front of an attendance of about 130. Shkendia equalise in stoppage time to gain a 1-1 draw. On our walk back to town pass the butchers where the three sheep that had earlier been tethered to a post outside are now hanging up in the shop and a cow is now tied to the post. 

For our final match, we have a 20- minute bus ride to the small town of Shijak. Many of the seats are loose, with ripped and torn upholstery and a canvas screen serves as the emergency door, but at 40 pence for the journey one cannot really complain. Stroll down a rough track to the ground that sits beside a cemetery. There is more life at the latter with relatives taking flowers to the graves of their departed ones while the only gate to the football ground is firmly locked. We then espy a sunflower seed vendor and some small kids hanging around the gate so retain hope of a game taking place. Adjourn to town for a drink where the quietness is broken by old men banging down dominoes at tables in the centre of the square.

Return to the grandly named T. Jashari Stadium to find a bit more action taking place, although this does not extend to the game itself as Erzeni Shijak and Skrapari draw a poor encounter 0-0 (head-counted attendance 244), in the third tier of the Albanian League. The only highlights are a penalty for the visitors which results in a weak easily saved spot kick and two policemen walking along the sideline holding hands. It is a pretty basic ground with one steep block of open concrete terracing at the centre of the far side with the changing rooms beneath. That is about it part from a grass bank that runs along the near side and a large industrial arch that appears to have nothing to do with football at one end.

Back in Durres visit the bar / restaurant adjacent to the Kaon Brewery, drinking amber beer served from 2,3 or 5 litre towers, until it runs out. Have time for a little more tourism on the Monday morning, including a climb up the Clock Tower for good views of the city, before returning to the airport for our early afternoon flight home. The standard of football may not have been too high, but the quirkiness of the grounds was some compensation and Albania as a country is certainly well worth a visit.

contributed on 15/09/11