Last month, I visited Edinburgh for the first time. Aside from taking in the sights, I was keen to take in a match there and eventually plumped for Hearts v Cowdenbeath.

Situated in the Gorgie area of the city and not far removed from Murrayfield, home of Scottish Rugby, Tynecastle has undergone a bit of a transformation in the last few years, with the building of the new main stand, where I would be seated for the evening. As the game was in the Betfred Cup group stage, tickets were limited to the Main Stand and sections of the Roseburn and Gorgie Stands behind the goals and were priced at a an extremely reasonable £10.

The ground is extremely easy to get to, with regular buses from Princes Street in the city centre, though as I was staying quite close to the area, I was able to walk there and back after the game, which took me around 15/20 minutes each way.

As for the game itself, I’ve already covered it in a previous post, but I had a good time and enjoyed my first experience of football in Scotland (the tenth country I’ve seen a match in) and I’ll definitely go back sometime.

I can’t really move on without mentioning ‘The Hearts Song’, the brilliant club anthem, which has been stuck in my head ever since I got back from Edinburgh. I really like this version by the Scottish indie band Frightened Rabbit.

“Some say the Rangers and Celtic are grand, but the boys in maroon are the best in the land.”

And just to balance things out, I paid a little visit to Easter Road, the ground of Hearts’ great rivals, Hibernian. Fun fact, the bus I got into the city centre most days goes past both clubs’ grounds.

If things had fallen a bit better for me, I could have seen a match there as well as Hibs were playing in the Europa League qualifying rounds on Thursday night. Alas I was already on a plane home by the time they staged an improbable comeback from 2-0 down to defeat Asteris Tripolis 3-2.