The Bucs cheerleaders were more popular in England than the Bucs. The same could be said about the locals.

Joe decided to check out a couple of London papers to see the reaction of the Bucs game yesterday.

Mostly, the scant stories dealt with anger toward the Glazers, love for the Bucs cheerleaders and, at best, disdain for the NFL.

The sites were loaded with kickball coverage, however.

Take this comment from a kickball fan in the Times of London.

What a load of rubbish. How can anyone call that a sport? Even if you discount the stupid armour and vomit inducing glitz it is about as exciting as netball. How is it possible to score a touchdown but not have to actually touch the ball down?

When you consider gridiron started as something like rugby, what the Yanks have done to it represents everything I dislike about them.

Well, once upon a time in football, players indeed had to “touch the ball down” when they crossed the goal line. Joe’s even seen films of such a practice. That’s how a score in football became known as a touchdown.

Then there’s this cat, another kickball fan posting on the London Sun website, who turned his nose up at the Bucs game.

I forced myself to watch this stuff in order to find out what all the fuss is about. I wish I hadn’t.

It seems to consist of about 3 second bursts of action punctuated by about a minute or more of interruptions for timeouts, adverts, music, dancing and incomprehensible analysis.

I could go on, but can’t be bothered. It’s a load of tosh. Compare it to the Liverpool vs. Man Utd game. No contest.

Probably the most interesting article Joe came across was a non-game story in the London Evening Standard which claims the Glazer Family’s debt on its kickball team is now at £699 million, or using a British pounds conversion calculator to United States dollars is $1.141 billion.

That’s billion with a “B.”

The London Evening Stardard even quoted that clown the Tampa Tribune and its expatriate reporters try to prop up as some Bucs spokesman of import and Joe will let the quote speak for itself.

The Glazers do have their supporters among Tampa fans. One is Paul Stewart, who founded the Bucs UK fan club and runs the Bucpower.com web site from Staines in Surrey. He attributes the lack of success to a “rebuilding year” caused because the Gruden regime “left the cupboard bare.”

He disagrees empathetically that owning Manchester United has caused the Glazers to ignore the Bucs. “The funny thing is everyone in America thinks they are spending all their money on Manchester United and everyone over here thinks they are spending their money on the Bucs and ignoring Manchester United. They can’t win.”