I wish they showed the football at the cinema

Jack Muir wants somewhere better to watch sport in St Andrews.

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Where is the best place in St Andrews to watch the football?

The group text has been sent to the ‘lads’ ready for the big kick off and so the debate of where to watch it has begun. Let’s explore the options.

Telling someone you lived in DRA while in first year was met with sympathetic eyes as if town was the Shire and a walk to DRA was the “furthest they’ve been from home.” However, there was an advantage; while most halls had studies and libraries, DRA thankfully (for me anyway) had a bar. It was easily accessible and showed most of the matches while serving Tennents for a mere £2. With relatively comfy sofas and fairly priced food, the DRA bar is a serious contender for best place in St Andrews to watch sport (although I have heard the price of a pint has grown substantially).

The Rule seems like a safe choice at first but there is the instant conundrum of where to sit. In a booth with a tiny monitor situated directly above your head, or on an awkward high chair craning your neck to see the fuzzy projected image behind the bar. The differently sized monitors splattered across various walls mean that the volume and quality of the commentary differs depending on where you sit. So, I find myself saying no to the Rule.

Although Rascals prizes itself as a “sports bar”, I don’t think it delivers. There is decent, if overpriced, food to be had and, with TVs that are better positioned than the Rule’s, Rascals initially seems like a fair shout. Unfortunately, chances are your neck will sit at an unnatural angle if you want a decent view of the screens, and a lot of the time music is playing instead of commentary.  I want to hear Gary Neville’s dulcet Mancunian voice break like a little girl’s when a team scores, not the distracting beat of Avicii or Macklemore. So, unless they turn the commentary on, and provide a masseuse, I say no to Rascals.

Is a bar like this really too much to ask for?

The Criterion and the Central are nicer pubs (probably because they are not geared towards students) and do show sport, but they aren’t natural places to watch sport. Having sport on is a bit of a background detail, a small distraction for when conversation runs dry. They are not comfy venues in which to watch sport and drink prices are extortionate. When I asked them what beer was their most affordable, they replied “have water, that’s free.” So, again, I say no.

The Blue Stane usually shows the match you want, there is audible commentary, and relatively good seating which puts it straight into contention. Sadly, the highly priced food isn’t great and is served by increasingly hostile staff (to students, at least). Furthermore, one TV is not the best quality and the other flickers black; not only this, but they are rarely in sync and so when the problems arise and you have to twist your head like an owl to view another monitor, you’re often viewing something that has already happened.  So I say no to the Blue Stane.

Having tried a few others not worth mentioning, and with the Union and Mabells currently in development, I seriously need advice on where to go. Is it too much to ask for a comfy, friendly, good food and drink pub that shows the most popular matches with sound to accompany it? Maybe it is, and I should just buy Sky Sports and sit with a beer and a Balgove burger. If only the cinema showed sport.

So where is the best place to watch the likes of the Superbowl, the Six Nations, the US Open and the Champions League?

Viewpoints established in this article are of the author, not The Stand.