Julio Jones awoke at 2 a.m. Tuesday and conceded Wednesday that he’s still not acclimated to local time. “It’s been rough on me,” he said. As for local transportation …
Jones and some fellow receivers ventured downtown Tuesday, the Falcons’ off-day here, from their posh hotel, which is 40 minutes north in Watford. They piled into a cab going and coming. The fare, Jones ruefully reported, was 78 pounds one-way. “That’s $125,” he said, incredulous. Then this: “It helps to be riding with guys who make a lot of money.”
He received a bit of ego gratification for his investment, though. He was recognized while walking in London. He posed for pictures with some teens, he said, and also with “a man and his wife — at least I assume it was his wife.”
Justin Blalock, the world’s most cultured left guard, saw the sights more economically — a shuttle bus to the train station, then a train into the city, then two cabs once there. For their initiative, he and two teammates crammed a week’s worth of sight-seeing into one overstuffed day.
“We saw Parliament, the British Museum, Buckingham Palace and the Eye of London,” he said, the latter being the giant Ferris wheel that dominates the skyline and takes nearly an hour to turn. “It went pretty slow,” said Blalock, who took a spin.
That was Tuesday. Wednesday was back-to-work day for this touring team, which arrived in the U.K. as askew, professionally speaking, as an NFL club ever gets. The Falcons have lost four in a row and are 2-5. None of their losses has been by single digits. When last seen they were blown out in Baltimore; will they be similarly bullied in Blighty?
“We’ve not played the kind of football we’re capable of playing,” coach Mike Smith said, treating Brit media types to some vintage Smitty-isms. “We’ve not coached the kind of football we’re capable of coaching.”
If that’s ever to happen, Sunday in Wembley against ascendant Detroit would seem a propitious moment. Asked if this “home” game was a Must Win, Blalock said: “Aren’t they all?”
Said Jones: “Yes, this is a must win.” Then, backtracking: “But if we lose, we’re not going to give up on ourselves.”
Said Matt Ryan, the quarterback: “We’re at the point where, moving forward, we’re going to have to win — starting this week.”
Were Sunday’s game in the Georgia Dome, a circling-of-wagons — to employ a distinctly American image — might be easier to imagine. But here the Falcons are, five time zones away (though the Brits turn back their clocks at midnight Saturday, a week before we Yanks do) and five losses into a season going bad, and they’re having their morning walk-through in a field adjacent to a golf course and their afternoon practice at a soccer training ground 15 minutes away, and how much circling can be done when you’re disoriented?
“We have kind of regressed offensively the past two weeks,” Smith said. “We haven’t been able to protect our quarterback.”
That’s never a good thing, but it’s especially bad when you’re about to face the NFL’s No. 1 defense and you’re down to your third-string center — James Stone, an undrafted rookie from Tennessee — who was pressed into services by the season-ending injuries to Joe Hawley and Peter Konz. (Can Thomas Dimitroff draft linemen who get hurt or what?)
For the record, Blalock is high on Stone: “To come into a game (in Baltimore) and start ID’ing defenses and making (line) calls like he did is really special.”
Also for the record, Ryan sees a possible benefit in his team’s sequestration: “It’s kind of nice that we’re together 24 hours a day. We’re able to sneak down and watch a little extra film.”
And, for what it’s worth, there was this: The Falcons seemed, all things considered, in a pretty good mood.
Jones, who’s not known as a quipster, was quite the hit at Wednesday’s media briefing, which was held — I kid you not — in a potting shed. Ryan conceded that he’d watched Manchester United’s Monday draw with West Bromwich Albion on the telly and was excited to be headed for Arsenal’s complex, the Gunners being one of the Premier League’s giants. (The Arsenal team wasn’t on hand, being otherwise occupied with a UEFA Champions League date in Antwerp against Anderlecht.)
“I’m a fan,” Ryan said, speaking of the English football. And the genesis of that ardor? “I started playing FIFA (a video game) in college. My team was AC Milan, which won’t go over well here.”
If it’s any consolation, Falcons-Lions won’t come close to being the biggest game in England on Sunday. The 84,000 tickets for Wembley have been sold, but there’s the massive matter of Chelsea, the London-based team atop the Premiership, playing Man U. at Old Trafford that same afternoon.
A few Londoners might recognize Julio Jones. Ninety-nine percent of Brits know the face of Jose Mourinho, the impertinent Chelsea manager, as well as they know their own sweet mum’s.
About the Author
