A revered sports journalist with more than 40 years experience would have attended some pretty big events.
But what would Roar Expert Greg Prichard say is the biggest sporting event he’s ever been to?
That would be Super Bowl XLVIII in 2014, between the Denver Broncos and Seattle Seahawks.
“I went to the Super Bowl off my own bat, because I’m a Peyton Manning fan.
“I had some spare cash and I took my son with me.
“It’s an incredible atmosphere and occasion and everything else, because the whole city becomes locked into it.”
Unfortunately for the Prichard family, that Super Bowl went pear-shaped for Manning’s Broncos on the very first play.
A safety conceded on Denver’s opening play gave Seattle the quickest score in Super Bowl history, and it only got worse from there, as the Seahawks piled on the pain in a 43-8 romp.
Not only did Prichard have to witness that, but he traveled to the US earlier in the season to watch the Broncos play the Patriots in Boston.
“The Broncos lead about 24-0 and got run down!” Prichard remembers.
“So I don’t know if I’m bad luck for him (Manning).”
More Prichard:
» My first encounter with Rupert Murdoch
» Covering the Swans during Cappermania
» The toughest person I’ve ever interviewed
» Super League memories two decades on
Kangajets
Guest
Australia v Uruguay 2005. Nothing comes close
sheek
Roar Guru
110,00 fans or close to it, Wallabies vs All Blacks 2000. In addition to that, one of the best games of test rugby ever. 75,000 at the MCG in 1998 a close second for me, when Wallabies broke a 7 game winning ABs streak. I was also at Stm Australia for the 2005 NRL grand final & Wests Tigers fairytale win in a thrilling game. Two incredible memories from SCG when I was a youngster, mainly for controversy surrounding both games. 1971 at SCG in January for final Ashes cricket test. English fast bowler John Snow fells Aussie spinner Terry Jenner with a bouncer. The crowd gets ugly. Snow returns to the long-on boundary about 40 metres from my position. He remonstrates with an angry, drunk fan who reaches across the fence & grabs his shirt. Skipper Ray Illingworth calls his team off the ground & the playing field is littered with beer cans, not all of them empty! Later that year at same venue I went to see Springboks clean up series against Wallabies 3-0 by winning 3rd test 18-6. But this was the protest tour & the match was continually played in a haze of smoke from smoke bombs & an ugly crowd venting their fury at South Africa's apartheid system. In a scene then unusual for Australia, barbed wire & policemen ringed the entire SCG fence. Another memory of SCG for entirely different reasons. In 1974 ABs beat Wallabies 11-6 in an arctic blizzard. It was the coldest, wettest, windiest, coldest (oh, I said that) day I can ever remember. My school mate & I were sitting on the eastern side of the ground, next to the then hill, but right in the path of the bitterly cold southerly winds coming straight from the Antarctic. I was wearing an army issue greatcoat, beanie, scarf & footy sox, but I still froze. The official attendance says 11,000 people were crazy enough to be there. I reckon it was half that number! Also in 1974 about two months later, attended the league test at the SCG when a 'dad's army' Kangaroos team brilliantly led by Change Langlands won a gripping 3rd test 22-18 & the series against a plucky British Lions team. Many other wonderful memories but unfortunately no overseas sporting experience for me.