Tonight, FC Cincinnati’s reserve squad took on the University of Dayton men’s soccer team in a friendly match at Nippert Stadium. We were anxious to finally get a glimpse of what Nippert looked as a soccer venue, what the view of the pitch looked like from our season ticket seats and whatever else we could glean from this evening’s match…

Nippert looked very bit as beautiful as a soccer stadium as I imagined it to be…

This is view we’ll have of the pitch for the season from our season ticket seats…

Here come the FC|C guys…

And the man, the myth, the legend, FC|C head coach, John Harkes…

We ducked into UC’s Catskeller for a quick beer before the match started. Glub, glub, glub… And then we were ready to go for kick-off…

We watched the first half from our season ticket seats…

Genifer got some nachos and I got some Bosco Sticks from Catskeller. Cheese sticks covered in more cheese. Maybe it was just warm breadsticks on a cold evening, but man, those things were good!

At half, it was UD lead FC|C’s reserves 1-0…

At the start of the second half, we were looking for someplace to sit to get away from the wind because it was starting to get a bit nippy out there at Nippert…

We were kinda taken aback by just how few FC|C fans showed up to support their team tonight. To say Nippert was sparsely populated would be kind.

We watched the last ten minutes of the match standing behind The Bailey out of the wind which was getting colder and colder…

It’s kinda tough to see corners from over there…

FC|C had some really good chances especially in the final few minutes. But at full-time, the match ended 1-0 to Dayton.

After getting to move around Nippert a bit, and get to see the game from different vantage points, we’re very happy with the location of the seats we chose for our season tickets. All tonight’s match did was get us even more excited for the first official USL FC Cincinnati home game at Nippert Stadium this Saturday!

Apparently, FC|C has eclipsed the 5,000 season tickets sold threshold, and has sold over 10,000 tickets to this Satuday’s inaugural home game. It should be an amazing atmosphere for what should be a very memorable night! And we can’t wait! 😀

Click to see all the FC Cincinnati photos I’ve taken so far!