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Remember that blog I wrote a couple of months back about visiting Huddersfield Town? Well, the January snow might have delayed us, but Dirs and Fordyce don't give up that easily - and here's that video I promised!

on our Marvellous, Magical, Mad Football League Tour, with Tom and me planning to visit more clubs from outside the in future.

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Fine, so it was all a bit before the Lord Mayor's Show at Twickenham on Saturday, but will still have been watching intently, rubbing out names from his team-sheet, going over others with indelible ink.

Whether the last Sunday allied with the will be enough to greatly increase England's quota of players to tour South Africa this summer remains to be seen.

But talk of the Welsh & Irish Lions - especially since, - has surely been consigned to history.

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The boos following suggest the Bolton lightweight still has some way to go to placate his more trenchant critics - and that the British disease of wanting to see their own fail has yet to be eradicated.

Put simply, Khan did what he had to do at the although the manner of victory wasn't entirely satisfactory. However, promoter Frank Warren, having seen three of his fighters suffer potentially career-ending defeats on the undercard, would surely disagree.

The cut sustained by Mexican legend Barrera in the opening round certainly spoilt the fight as a spectacle, but Khan still did enough to show that his partnership with only two fights old, is having the desired effect.

Khan was too fast, too strong and ultimately too young for his 35-year-old opponent, although it shouldn't be forgotten that Barrera was effectively one-eyed for most of the fight. Crucially, Roach is also succeeding in moulding a more patient, cerebral fighter.

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Frank Warren's sickness following a will be as nothing next to the feeling he'll have in the pit of his stomach if on Saturday.

For while Warren and hundreds of other diners were laid low by an as yet unknown assailant lurking within , Khan's promoter will only have himself to blame if Barrera does a number on his boy in Manchester: Barrera's ability to induce guts ache is hardly a mystery.

Make no mistake, pitting the 22-year-old Bolton lightweight against Mexican legend Barrera is a significant punt on the part of Warren, usually so cautious, in match-making if not culinary terms.

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While news conferences at Lord's and Twickenham usually have all the razzmatazz of a Requiem Mass, you can be sure that when there's a big fight that needs promoting, the nation's boxing writers will get a little more than a ream of platitudes to go with their custard creams.

So at , we were treated to a history lesson on the Second World War from promoter and some rhymes from Ricky Hatton's trainer .

Oh, and the startling revelation from Manny Pacquiao's trainer that his charge ran away from home as a boy after discovering his father had eaten his dog. Something tells me the Pacman's going to trump Hatton in the salt-of-the-earth stakes.

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