(EJ Salisbury is a Back Page Lead correspondent based in Beijing and Abu Dhabi.)

It's a hard life for a Beijing qiumi these days. Qiumi in Mandarin translates as ‘football fan.' The word is made up of two characters: qiu meaning ball and mi meaning lost (or, in this context, obsessed). Beijing's hordes of qiumi are feeling pretty lost this week after the city's team, Beijing Guo'an, has just lost two matches in one week, the first to the hated Shanghai Shenhua club and the second to Hangzhou Greentown.

The Beijing Guo'an Football Club is owned by the CITIC Group, a major state-owned enterprise. Moreover, in 2009 the State Sports Administration (effectively the Ministry of Sport) invested RMB20 million in the club. This makes the club very much that of the Chinese Government.

Last Wednesday night, Back Page Lead bought tickets for Guo'an's match against Hangzhou Greentown and strolled over to the Beijing Workers Stadium around 6.30pm on a warm evening to experience first-hand what Chinese football looks like, sounds like, and feels like.

The verdict? First, the crowd is more exciting to watch than the players. Second, it's something any visitor to China should do to get a sense of what the country is really like. All up, it's slightly scary and great fun.

The first thing that strikes you approaching the stadium is the huge number of police and paramilitary uniforms in the streets , including a riot squad in full armour at each of the three entrances to the stadium grounds. Add to this a few dozen Alsatian dogs held on leashes by scowling police. Sure, China is a one party state with strict supervision of its citizens and a ruthless attitude to dissidents, but since the shocking violence of the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident overt displays of military uniforms are kept to a bare minimum. Except, it seems, before football matches.

The serried ranks of grim-faced riot policemen combined with the jaunty attitude of the many thousands of young qiumi give the atmosphere a delightful sense of danger, a feeling that the citizens of Beijing are not about to be cowed by the brute strength of the State.

Inside the ground the Beijing Guo'an fans, wearing the deep green team colour, divided into two groups. (That's them, pictured above, saluting a Saralva Antonio goal in a recent AFC Champions League match). The boyfriend-girlfriend couples and older fans sat in the lower tier where the seats are more expensive, while the thousands of more dangerous fans occupied the upper tier. For all the police presence outside the ground, inside the place they stayed below, close to the edge of the pitch, well away from the wilder brigade up top. Seeing first hand the all-powerful Party and State intimidated by a group of ordinary citizens is both bewildering and inspiring. But it was true: the police were afraid of these fans.

The Hangzhou supporters who came to watch their boys play were small in number and confined to a section of the upper tier both well away from the Beijing fans and well away from the pitch. Hundreds of policemen sat each side of the visitors. As China's history shows, civil disorder always lurks just under the surface. To see its possibility right before one's eyes is quite a thrill.

Upstairs the Guo'an wild brigade had unfurled a number of foreign flags and draped them over the balcony - Australia, Brazil, Scotland, Serbia - doubtless to celebrate the various foreign players in the team. Guo'an has two brothers from Australia, Joel and Ryan Griffiths. One dedicated fan unrolled a white poster carrying the English words         ‘Joel we support you! Willberk is pig!' The scandal behind this poster is still a mystery.

Joel Griffiths is a much-loved striker among Guo'an's qiumi for his efforts helping Guo'an win the Super League championship. During the year he was suspended twice for a total of 11 games for both aggressive tactics onfield and for giving opposing fans a well known digital gesture of contempt but still managed to score the second most goals in the Chinese Super League. Perhaps the mysterious Willberk had something to do with the suspensions.

With the air still humid, a good few male fans lifted their shirts to cool their stomachs. This is a common Chinese habit. People smoked cigarettes and started brandishing green plastic trumpets. Female Guo'an fans began donning hairbands carrying little green plastic horns illuminated from the inside.

With sore memories of last Saturday night's defeat by Shanghai Shenhua the Guo'an fans started chanting loudly: Shenhua faa pii! Shenhua faa pii! - Shenhua farts! Shenhua farts!

After the crowd sang the national anthem, the game began and though the play was not of a particularly high standard the crowd immediately got very excited. When the referee awarded a free kick against Guo'an the fans exploded with fury, an older woman in front screaming abuse in a piercing voice like the whistle on a kettle of boiling water. The referee then copped his own chant from the crowd.

Faa pii! Faa pii! Faa pii!

By this time one was feeling hungry, but nobody seemed to be selling hot dogs or any sort of food. Ms Demi Deng, who accompanied this column to the game, laughed when asked why no food was on sale.

"No way!" she shouted over the cacophony, explaining that there was a danger an enraged fan would hurl a sausage at the players. Likewise no water or drink in plastic bottles was on sale, only Coke and chilled water served in plastic cups.

On the field, each team had around four foreign players. In the first half Guo'an played aggressive football and had the ball in their half for most of the time, but the Greentown defence was too strong and Guo'an couldn't score. Luis Ramirez, a tall Honduran striker playing for Greentown looked especially dangerous. Sure enough in the second half, Ramirez came blazing through the pack and with a terrific kick managed to score the game's first goal.

Faa pii! Faa pii! erupted from the ranks of shocked Guo'an fans. An expression of dread appeared on thousands of Chinese faces. Not again! Up above on the upper tier a white poster appeared carrying a series of Chinese characters denouncing the referee. The crowd cheered as the poster was shown around.

Play continued, but the Guo'an players were starting to tire. Greentown players demonstrated neat, even elegant passing. Now and then Guo'an rallied as either Joel Griffiths or a teammate tried to push the ball forward. Then disaster struck when Ramirez suddenly goaled again.

Now it was the Beijing coach who copped the faa pii-ing. A half full plastic bottle of water came sailing down from above and burst on the cement right next to the policemen in front of us, splashing them all with water. The fans loved this. At least someone else was copping it. The policemen jumped up and started pointing small video cameras at the upper tiers, from whence a crescendo of abuse was heard. More shouts came.

Fire the coach! Fire the coach!

With little time left and the team two down, angry Guo'an fans started leaving the stadium, mostly girls first. Having won the championship only last year, something has gone awfully wrong. The expressions on their faces said it all. Somehow, and sometime soon, someone is going to pay for this.