No, I'm not a Wembley ticket tout!

Wembley today for the third NFL International Series game between my beloved New England Patriots and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
But, with a book out and copies to sell I got there really early with Lorraine to dish out thousands of cards plugging Touchdown UK.
After casing the area I plumped for a spot outside the steps of the station next to the touts and T-shirt sellers and proceeded to dish out cards.
Two hours later we’d shifted hundreds of the damn things and thankfully didn’t find a huge mound of them a few metres behind us! Wembley, it seems, took those cards home.
Next time I see someone handing out leaflets at a sports match I think I’ll vow to take one.

OK, so I was trying to plug a book, but the sense of rejection you get when people don’t even look at you isn't good. Why do they think I am so dodgy?!
While dishing out the cards I bumped into Adam Goldstein, who has blogged about tailgating around the US at NFL games. You can’t miss Adam in his distinctive Bears get-up and that crazy hat.
Adam’s got a book out of his own next year and had to rush to an interview with Sky TV.
After much card handing out we made our way down Wembley way and saw NFL Commissioner Roger Goddell being interviewed.
Inside the stadium it was a good atmosphere. As it was the Pats I lavished £75 each on tickets high up on the sidelines – If I had realised how high it was I’d never have chosen them. Talk about being high up!
Lorraine said she felt a little giddy at the top – we were actually on the back row which made the whole thing a bit surreal – it felt like watching the old arcade game Sensible Soccer.
I actually watched most of the game on the big TV screens at each end of the ground, you can see far more there anyway.So the Pats won comfortably as expected but so comfortable was their margin of victory that I was pretty bored in the final quarter and we left five minutes early to head home.
Next time though, I think I’ll sit a little closer to the action.

All hail the USAFE guys

I'm back from a week in Vegas plugging my book and
what a great trip. Hat's off to a couple of legends in Scott Thomas and Rob Causey for inviting us over, both guys played USAFE football back in the 80s not too far from my home in Bury.

Rob's wife Deb is from Essex so would be great to meet up again when they come over to our side of the pond.

I was co-speaker at this third reunion with Bucky Fox, former sports reporter with Stars and Stripes newspaper, a genuine character with a brilliant catchphrase whenever we had a picture taken of "Live on CBS!". Hilarious.

Bucky's speech was excellent and made my shambolic rambling sound a little pants, but the message I was trying to get across was that these USAFE guys should not be forgotten.

That was drummed home when I met Dick Edwards, a man who played at Wembley back in the mid 1950s for London Rockets.

Dick had his beautiful original yellow shirt which was in excellent condition, clearly a treasured item for Dick.

His wife is a former Miss UK and still looked stunning and it was great to meet his proud son who laughed when Dick held up his original face mask and I told him he looked like Hannibal Lector!

The convention at Hooters involved around 35 ex-USAFE players, and I managed to get a Stars and Stripes flag signed by the guys at the end, a real treasured memento.

We had six days in Planet Hollywood and as well as bagging a whole haul of NFL items, checked out Peep Show staring Playboy Bunny Holly Madison.

My book is finally out!

Great news: my book, Touchdown UK is released today!

It's taken about a year to complete from start to finish so please go and buy a copy!

It's available for £14.99 from www.authorhouse.co.uk

Getting paid to be a Sports Junkie

I feel old today. Real old.
Last night I went to London to watch Norwich play QPR and, although the match was a shocker played in driving rain, the 1-0 win could prove crucial if we are to avoid the dreaded drop to League One.
I’m not really familiar with this part of town, but after speeding down the A12/M25 to my auntie’s house in Middlesex, I had a trip on the Tube involving a serious amount of changes.
I ended up at White City just before 7pm and walking past the BBC TV Centre I called Lorraine and told her I was waving at the building in the hope that I would appear behind Adrian Chiles and Christine Bleakley on the One Show backdrop.
It wasn’t to be, but inside the ground as the action started, I did spy a BBC presenter. I sat, well, stood, behind Jake Humphrey, Norwich fan and BBC Sport presenter.
Jake’s a man who gets paid big bucks to present Formula One all over the world. He was at the bloody Super Bowl a couple of weeks ago and for a man my age, has an enviable job.
I thought about mentioning my book as it’s due out in a few weeks and I know he’s a big NFL fan but was too concerned with the on-field action.
When I got home I Googled Jake, to see how old he was.
The git is three years younger than me!

Young Sam passes the football test

It's a big year for me 2009 - it's 25 years since I first went to Carrow Road to watch a live game of football.

Yes, back in November 1984 aged nine years and eight months I saw Norwich hammer Everton 4-2.

Without kids of my own yet, I always felt a bit of responsibility to my take my oldest nephew Sam when he was roughly the same age. And today, aged nine years and eleven months I took him along with my brother Andrew to watch Norwich take on Barnsley.

Norwich have gone through big changes since I went to that game in 1984 and big changes since I was last at a game with my brother - that would have been March 1987 - 22 years earlier!!

Back then Andrew and I went to two games in a fortnight at Carrow Road as Norwich took on Wimbledon and Luton.

Both games finished in 0-0 draws, the quality on the pitch was so bad that I vividly recall standing on the River End and Andrew saying to me early in the second half of the Luton game that he wanted to get some doughnuts and go wait outside for me.

He stuck around and would have seen Bryan Gunn doing his best to keep the likes of Mick Harford and Brian Stein at bay.

Gunn of course was made Norwich boss this week and this was his first game in charge - a fact lost on Sam who only knew one Norwich player and that was Wes Hoolahan because someone at his school knew him.

Sam looked half asleep in the first half and quite right - the football was rubbish and the only time his eyes lit up was when he devoured a huge half-time hot dog.

I was praying for goals to give the kid something to tell his nephews about in the future and my mind went back to November 1984 and the fact I saw City hit four.

Lo and behold the goals came as who else but Hoolahan gave Norwich a 55th minute lead. Sam sort of stood up and cheered a bit. Jamie Cureton made it 2-0 with a tasty lob on his return to Carrow Road and by the time Sammy Clingan and Darel Russell notched up late goals, he was really starting to enjoy it.

I'd say he passed the test - so thanks Norwich for making it so memorable!