This man was a native Bostonian so how did he know I was from Bath, England?

Was I a famous son of our City easily recognised across the world? Sadly not.

Was I a local politician whose influence had spread across the pond? Thankfully not.

Was I wearing my "Fiends of the Rec" badge to demonstrate that I am one of the six most dedicated and knowledgeable people who only care about the city of Bath's welfare? Definitely not!

Of course you'll have guessed already that the Bostonian was able to spot my connections to the Georgian city because I was wearing a Bath Rugby shirt, thus demonstrating that the colours of our club is one of the best advertising brands accessible to the City of Bath.

It turns out that this American lived in Bath for some 18 months and had started supporting the rugby, attending as many matches as he could.

"So have you developed the Rec yet, it really needs it?"

I proceeded to explain our situation and he was astonished. Mainly that the City Fathers would allow the club to leave the Rec let alone the boundary. He commented how he loved Bath and talked of the rugby club as "our club" which he still supported from afar.

A few days later I took a tour of Fenway Park, the home of the legendary Boston Red Sox. The Park is the oldest stadium in America and the smallest. Every game is a sellout (bearing in mind they play some 80 home games a season) and there has been pressure for them to move from their location (close to the centre of Boston) so they can build a bigger stadium, make more money and satisfy the baseball hungry city.

The Sox won't move, they feel their heritage is too important to them and so they are looking to extend their existing stadium with a sympathetic re-model of the ground. This will meed the demand of some fans but not many but still they refuse to compromise and the City is grateful they don't do what other major American sporting clubs have done by moving their franchise to another location where they could make a fortune.

Being in Boston during the week when the Sox were trying to get to the World Series was amazing with about 1:10 of inhabitants wearing club colours, shops all proclaiming "Go Sox" and almost saturation coverage on local TV.

Unfortunately the Sox failed at the final hurdle and lost to the Tampa Bay Rays in the final game of seven (having been 1-3 down).

Tell me, is there a lesson here somewhere?

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