The Perfect Combination

We all love to give or have an opinion on things. We love to rank and rate things. We love to compare and contrast. I love all those things. I also love to travel. I also love to watch sports. All this loving combined leads me to one thing – a ranking of my favourite places to watch sport from all the places I have travelled. We’re not talking venues or stadiums, we’re talking top five sports bars baby!

1.       Lagasse’s Stadium – Las Vegas

This is the sports bar of all sports bars and I have been here just a couple of times. The bar is shaped and designed like a stadium, and has a stack load of ridiculously comfortably sofas and couches to watch any of the 20 big screens on the far wall. Words cannot describe this one I’m afraid until you go on a Sunday afternoon and watch NFL there. Book in advance, that’s all I will say, but it is well worth it.

2.       Real Sports Bar & Grill – Toronto

The reason I am writing this blog is because I am in Toronto this week and there’s only one place my buttocks will be perching throughout the day on Saturday! This place is insanely large, has the filthy North American menu that we all dream about (but the obesity nightmare promptly follows), and a huge range of beers. There is literally a television screen everywhere you look – it is just tough to watch them all!

3.       ESPN Sports Bar – Now defunct but was in NYC and LV

Another dream venue for any sports/beer/food fan with screens coming out of your ears and plenty of beer on tap. I have to admit however, the winner for this place was unquestionably the spicy BBQ sauce that came with the chicken tenders – no better taste in the whole wide world. Actually, they sold it on in Vegas at New York New York hotel, but it is virtually the same and just branded differently.

4.       Hooters – Anywhere

Now I know what you are thinking. Rob, you’re a filthy pervert and I shall never look at you in the same light ever again. I’m looking at the screens I promise, just the screens. Oh, and the boneless chicken wings! Who would have thought that they could make boneless chicken wings! Sounds innocuous now I think about it, but aside from those, it is a great place and atmosphere to watch sports. Honest.

5.       Walkabout – Various

Now in some respects, I am not sure this one merits reaching this list – there is esteemed company. What I will say however, is that going to Walkabout to watch any England v Australia game in any sport is fabulous and highly recommended. I’m not saying it won’t be dirty, there may be a chav or two, and the carpets may be sticky, but you will occasionally find a good one somewhere across the UK and have an entertaining session. Ok, maybe I am clutching at straws here.

When I was 16, I worked in Wakefield. They opened a Sports Bar just around the corner from the restaurant that I worked at. As I started work at 5pm, that gave me an hour to watch football before starting work, so I frequented the bar every Saturday afternoon. It was a fantastic place and the kind of place that I dreamed could be exported into my cellar when I grew up and had my own place. Sadly, it did not take long to go downhill. It attracted the wrong crowd, and it eventually had chards of glass on the sticky carpet which promptly tells you to leave a bar as soon as you have entered. Sad but true. I love the concept of a sports bar, but I have yet to really stumble across a gem in the UK like I have in North America which is why the list comprises largely of North American establishments. That along with the fact that watching sport, drinking beer, and eating filthy North American food is great fun. If anybody knows of any awesome sports bars, anywhere in the world, I want to know please. Don’t be shy.

Patriot Games

I need to raise my game.  I enjoy blogging, but I am underperforming. I need to write more. This blog should have come four weeks ago, but better late than never right? I have to write a blog for Onside Analysis next week, so I’m writing a Random one to get back in the swing of things before I get my teeth stuck into that one.

Both my Uncle George and I vividly recall the battles and discussions we used to have when I was a small chap as I raved about how cool Germany and some of my exchange student friends were, and he recalled conflicts going way back to the 40s. We relished the battles then, and we laugh about them now. Maybe it was the respect for each other that we understood the way the other one felt, but neither of us backed down or gave ground.

There was nothing ever racist about those feelings, just the kind of feelings you would have if you had been involved in a war no doubt. The irony about it all, and a key part of my argument was that I loved spending time in Germany and with my German friends because we had so much in common. Similar sense of humour, a beer drinking culture, a passion for football, and in many respects, a pride about their nation......which lends itself to single-mindedness and stubbornness. All the ingredients to make a war, but to make a friend also. The Germans are far more like the English than many other nationalities. They are different, but they are similar. More so than many other countries close by.....read France, Spain, Italy etc.

My favourite national team when I was a child was Argentina. My hero in the playground was Diego Armando Maradona. Not the most popular team or player in England at that time, and not now. Diego was amazing to watch, it never mattered to me where he came from. 1990 was a slight shift in emphasis, but for some reason I admired the filthiness and ruthlessness that they employed right until the very end. The very definition of filth. It was more than England ever showed however in my eyes.

I have never been patriotic. The closest I have ever come to the word patriotic is supporting the New England Patriots. As a kid, I took a shine for Everton. Not Leeds where I am born and bred. Everybody else around me was a Leeds fan. I wanted something different. In cricket, I followed Hampshire because I adored the finesse and grace of David Gower, the brutality of Robin Smith and his awesome square cuts, and the bowling action of Malcolm Marshall. It was never Yorkshire.

The only tinges of patriotism I have had in recent years have come while I have been living abroad or living with foreigners in the UK while at Uni. People love to hammer England. I quite enjoy it myself, but it is a bit like me criticising my mother. It is fine if I do it, but god forbid anybody else to have a go! (Not that I would Mum, not that I would!)

I was super sceptical about the Olympics. That was more down to security and transport issues than anything else, but also because i have never been patriotic and I have never been taken by the Olympics. There are too many sports that just do not do it for me – in truth that is the same now. However, I have a new found appreciation for some sports. BMX being one, and Handball being another.

These two photos and moments did it for me. How could you not be taken by such an amazing spectacle? It was however the way in which virtually the whole country united around the Games that was a pleasure to watch. A pleasure regardless of whoever you are and where you come from, but unquestionably a sense of pride that it is your country that has put on this fantastic show. Regardless of where you come from, if you were sat in the Olympic Stadium watching Mo Farah win the 5k and 10k races, I defy anybody not to have had goose bumps. Watching the Jamaican 4x100m relay team was the same.

Maybe I am more patriotic than I would like to believe or show, maybe it just resides somewhere deep inside and it only comes out when it is pushed. Maybe having a father who cheers Brazil at the World Cup, Spain at the Euros, Man Utd in the Premier League, and whoever he has bet on in any other sport, has led to me being just as confused about my roots. The Olympic managed to bring everybody together. It felt a bit like one of our family parties actually. Everybody has their quirks, their differences, but never let that get in the way of a bloody good do. If you don’t like German people, then go to Oktoberfest in the next few weeks, and a bit like the Mo Farah moments, I defy anybody to come back with a negative experience. And if you don’t like me or my blog, then I invite you to a family BBQ next summer...there’s just something special about bringing people together and having a good time – regardless of where you’re from or what team you support.