As An American Would You Travel To Wembley For Hatton vs Paq/ODLH?

Cricket is the 2nd most popular team sport in the world

 

I'd go for Hatton vs Pac if Pac beats Oscar.

 

I think British sport is much more passionate for one very important reason, it is tribal and about where you are from for true fans. This leads to some fantastic rivalries across the UK e.g. Manchester Utd and Liverpool, Rangers & Celtic, Spurs & Arsenal etc. I could be way off beam here, but are not many American sports not run on a franchise basis that means they move between cities e.g. in American Football I remember getting confused when I was younger when the LA Raiders moved to Oakland (I'm sure if I've got this wrong American posters will tell me).

Internationally we have a long running soccer rivalry with Germany. In Cricket our natural 'enemy' is Australia, as per Rugby.

Most of these rivalries go back over 100 years which is why Ricky Hatton (a devoted Manchester City fan, hence the Blue Moon entrance song, which is synonymous with that football club) got so much stick a few fights back when Wayne Rooney (a Manchester United footballer) carried his belts into the ring.

I could be wrong but I don't think you get these all consuming rivalries in the UK and another reason 'true' fans in the UK never switch allegiance even when their teams are doing badly.

 

If a fight between Hatton and ODLH/Pac came off and they decided to hold it in Wembley, then any American who goes, i'm sure, would have the experience of a lifetime. It's one thing having only 10,000 fans packed into a small arena. 10x that amount in the most famous stadium in the world would be something else entirely.

 

Mate, you are wrong here.

The problem for you guys is that you have a mix of sports which have greater or lesser dominance in different regions.

In New Zealand, the entire nation shuts down when the All Blacks play rugby.

In the last World Cup, 21.8% of New Zealand households had a TV set tuned in to the final.

One out of every five households in the nation had a TV tuned to the game. And that number doesn't include people who watched it at the pub, or went to a mate's house, etc. That's people watching the game on their own TV, so the real number is significantly higher. That's pretty impressive numbers.

But they become more impressive when you consider these two factors:

1) The game was on the other side of the planet and started at 4am New Zealand time, so people had to set their alarms, get up and watch it. There were also tape-delayed replays of the knockout games broadcast at 8am.

2) New Zealand wasn't even in the final. The All Blacks got knocked out of the tournament by France, who got beaten in the next round by England.

So almost a quarter of the nation got out of bed at 4am to switch on their TV and watch the final, not to cheer their team, but to watch the team who beat the team who beat the All Blacks try to win the World Cup.

That's fanaticism.

:hat

 

LOL come on. Return flights are $400-500 max. I recently got a return for $250 to LA and $275 to Atlanta.

Accomondation is going to be $500, where the **** you stayin, a suite in the Hilton?

You'd be looking at seats very near ringside for 600...

 

am british and am going regardlessssssssssss

 

The best seats are in my living room watching HBO.