I watched the two NFL Conference Championship games last night. Now I know it can get mighty cold in some of those northern US towns and cities and Green Bay, Wisconsin looks to me like it’s always cold. So I was a little surprised when I heard commentator Joe Buck state just before the game started, that the temperature was -1. Until, of course, I remembered that our American friends measure temperature on the silly scale – Fahrenheit.

So, to put that in perspective and to use a sensible measure of temperature that almost everyone else can understand – by the middle of the game the temperature was -4 which is a bloody chilly -20 Centigrade. What’s more, it was windy. Very windy. The wind-chill temperature on the field was -24, which is a bone-freezing -31.

I’ll say that again. Minus Thirty One Degrees Centigrade!

Now you could dress me up in the warmest clothes imaginable and stick me in front of a space heater and I would still be howling. Although at that temperature I’d probably be frightened to open my mouth in case my tongue froze. As I was watching, I couldn’t really understand why fully grown men, many of them intelligent and probably quite sensible most of the time, would want to run around on a field in -31C – many of them with bare arms! Until the commentator mentioned that one of the players had just signed a 30 million dollar contract for the next five years. And that’s why!

Would I run around on a field being thrown to the ground and constantly battered in those sort of temperatures for three and a half hours if i was being paid that sort of cash to do it? Let’s face it… it would be tempting! But I still think that they are insane.

As to the games themselves? Tame and messy both of them. And the wrong teams won! A face off in the Superbowl between Tom ‘The Smug’ Brady and Eli ‘The Brat’ Manning. Nah… don’t think I’ll stay up for that one.

Sky TV NFL coverage may have forgotten that the Oakland Raiders exist, not even including them in their roundup of yesterdays games in last nights broadcast, but I haven’t. And I would have thought that a surprise win over Denver where their hitherto appalling offence put up 35 points, was worthy of at least a footnote.

That’s two on the trot – both against divisional rivals. Now I learnt today that the last time the Raiders won two weeks running against teams in their own division was in the closing two weeks of the 2001-2002 season. The first win was against Denver. The second against the Chiefs. As it happens, my family and I were in the Coliseum to witness the first of these (with my youngest son sporting a Denver shirt until he started to feel a tad intimidated!) And we watched the second game a week later – which was I seem to recall played out in pouring rain) – from the comfort of our Florida rental. And that was when Rich Gannon (pictured) was still their quarterback!

And it all seems so bloody long ago! Could this be the start of a long overdue comeback for the silver and black?

Last nights loss by the Indianapolis Colts to the New England Brady Bunch more or less finishes the season doesn’t it? I mean to say, the Colts blew themselves up really with three trips to the Patriot’s red zone that only secured 6 points and a crippling 15 yards of penalties at the crucial last but one drive that gave the ball back to Mr Smirk. And, oh yes, a couple of turnovers.

Let’s be honest here – like them or not the New England Patriots are playing almost flawless football and the belief is spreading that they are, this year, unbeatable. So let’s get it over with. Bring the Superbowl forward to next week, the the Patriots ‘A’ team play their practice squad and put everyone else out of their misery. Consign the season to the record books and have another go next year.

The picture shows the defeated Peyton Manning congratulating Brady after the game. As Manning still had his helmet on, (after all he seems to have been born with it in place) I don’t understand why he didn’t headbutt the bugger there and then.

With the new NFL season due to start tomorrow I just thought I ought to nail my colours to the mast once again for the, er, Oakland Raiders.

OK – so it’s a forlorn hope. I’m not expecting much. They are a team in transition. Well, they have been a team in transition for about 5 seasons now ever since they lost John Gruden and then Rich Gannon. And they seem to have spent most of that time transitioning from pretty bad to dire so really the only way for them has got to be up.

Actually, I’m feeling quite upbeat that this is the year they will turn the tide and at least win as many games as they lose. Culpepper could be a good fit if he stays healthy and confident and he has something to prove. And Randy Moss has moved on.

And that’s the big problem really isn’t it? If Moss gets back to his best play, then the bloody Patriots are going to start smelling of Superbowl all over again and we will have to suffer another year of Tom Brady’s smug grin. And the Colts? Somehow I doubt it.

So… Go Raiders!

I see that the NFL ‘Europe’ experiment is being closed down. Well – it’s no great loss. I am a huge NFL fan but it didn’t interest me for many reasons.
First up of course were the locations. I might travel 100 miles or so for a good game but Germany? But I think the main two reasons for the failure were the small number of teams and, more importantly, the lack of continuity of players form year to year.
It was, in short, a complete and totally uninteresting mess and I for one will not mourn it’s passing