Frankfurt* Galaxy center Charles Missant has been writing a weekly diary for NFL Europe.com throughout the 2006 NFLEL season. Now that his team has qualified for the final, Missant will write every other day through the week leading up to Yello Strom World Bowl XIV on Saturday.*
We played our very first game here at LTU Arena against the Rhein Fire. It's a nice venue, with a retractable roof. The facilities seem to be pretty nice. The practice fields are alright; they were pretty torn up from Rhein practicing on them. One funny aspect about Rhein is that they screwed with all of their equipment before they left town. They emptied their John Deer tractor tire that our equipment guys use, and stuff like that. It was pretty humorous, as we probably would have done the same thing had we been going home early too.
It was cold and rainy the first day of practice, and today it was just windy. They have an indoor weight room facility, which is actually an indoor track and field center. It's not designed for American football, but it works well for us to lift.
Düsseldorf is a nice place. It's spread out with a city you can go downtown to, but for the most part it is mainly countryside from what I've seen. The Galaxy and the Admirals went to downtown Düsseldorf to the mayor's dinner. We met the mayor of Düsseldorf and he gave out awards to both of our coaches. Getting here to the World Bowl, our main emphasis is winning the game. We didn't come here to lose. You could sense a little tension between the two teams, from what I felt, and that's good. It just shows that everybody has a sense of competitiveness. We're a hungry football team. The Amsterdam football team beat us twice this season, and we're not going to let that happen again.
Our team hotel is decent. They have a nice menu set up for us here with wings, burgers, and a variety of different snacks that we can order. We have a game room with a pinball table, darts, and things like that. A lot of us guys have been getting together and playing poker. We have a pretty good time. There's not too much to do in the surrounding area, so we have just been laying low, drinking water and preparing for the game. It's basically like a big animal house. Everyone's living together and hanging out with each other. It's a close-knit group. We're looking to focus on the game. We don't want to be out partying before a game of this magnitude.
We got here for a reason. Our main point of emphasis is staying consistent. We've done all the right things to get here, and we don't want to break down or change our game plan this late in the game. If we can continue what we've been doing, I think we'll be successful.
I talked to Casey last night. I try to talk to her every night, but sometimes I can't get a hold of her because she's working or doing something. She's busy with work and everything, and she made it home alright from Frankfurt. She got all of our pictures from Europe developed and she's putting together a photo album. Hopefully when things work out in New York she'll be able to come live with me and we can start a whole new adventure together.
In terms of the game, I try to visualize how I'm going to play, but that comes with having a great week of practice. We had a great day of practice today, and by continuing to have a solid week of practice and staying consistent with our game plan, it will transfer to a good team performance in the World Bowl. We've played these guys twice, and we know whom we're going against. They have some good players, but we have some good players too. This is just a great week to focus and finish strong. We're in the championship game, and it's all or nothing. I think we're ready to go out there and execute, do what we do, and finish strong. NFL Europe.com
