NFL Football comes to London

[mij]

Two from Sunday:

Stadium shot (look at that lovely sky):


TOUCHDOWN!:


Because of the usual stadium "no professional camera" rules I did not risk taking my 70-200/2.8 and instead dusted off my old Sigma 70-300 APO. Sadly the focus was too slow so most came out a blur, but at least when it worked it was one that counted, as Deuce entered the endzone.

Is the composition okay? It feels top heavy but I wanted to keep in the paint on the field so you can tell it is the goal line.

Top one was taken at 10mm with a Sigma 10-20mm.

Michael.

[ride328is]

stupid saints =(

other then that they look nice, i like the stadium shot a lot

[tmalone893]

I love the second picture. Cooper has some guns on him, two players at one time.
Go Saints!!!

[mikeassk]

Wow what a gorgeous stadium!

Nice captures for sure!

[la canon amateur]

Wonderful shots, glad to see a fellow member got to see a great game in person. The stadium was very impressive on the "tele". And the same can be said for #1.

[HuskyKMA]

Nice shot of the stadium. It was interesting to see that people in the stands weren't just wearing Saints and Chargers gear, but stuff from pretty much all of the teams.

[mij]

Gone through some more, a shame the action shots did not work out, but did better where I had time to focus first...





And they say the photo never lies:




Brees couldn't be more alone if he was Bud Selig in an umbrella store*:




Michael.

* This is a popular catchphrase of Mike Carlson, the main analyst for the BBC and FIVE and former lacrosse team mate of Bill Belichick at Weslyan. He regularly uses versions of it during his voiceover of the highlights on FIVE.

[mij]

And more...







Over here we would say "you could drive a bus through that gap in the defense":






That was the best of them for the actual game. I pretty much set myself to 1/200th, f/5.6, and ISO 800. Might have had more sharper ones had I compromised more with the ISO/shutter speed though.

Michael.

[mij]

Thanks for the comments everyone.

Originally Posted by la canon amateur

Wonderful shots, glad to see a fellow member got to see a great game in person. The stadium was very impressive on the "tele". And the same can be said for #1.

Really enjoyed it, so much better than the Dolphins one last year. Admittedly the weather helped this time.

Thanks for letting us take one of your games! Last year the Celtics played an NBA exhibition game in London and then the Giants cam over in week 8, and look how they both worked out. Could be a good omen for the Saints.

(Although you need to forget the Kings and Ducks opened the NHL season here too, but there was no mojo for them.)

Originally Posted by KevinAldrich

Nice shot of the stadium. It was interesting to see that people in the stands weren't just wearing Saints and Chargers gear, but stuff from pretty much all of the teams.

Aye, most people went in their own teams colours. The majority though, including me, were supporting the Saints on the day as they had given up their home game to come here. Definitely more of a home game atmosphere than last year where the crowd was split as both the Giants and Dolphins have large fanbases.

As you would expect, with most fans over here having no real ties to any particular US city the most popular teams are the ones who went through a period of success so got shown on TV more often. The Dolphins are popular because the game first got big over here during the Marino era.

The Saints and Chargers have smaller fanbases here, but with Sunday's game being shown live on the BBC as well as Sky Sports I reckon the Saints may have won over neutrals and new fans.

Michael.