In covering the impact of Golden Jubilee and the World Cup on local life for our club Newsreel, I searched around to unite the two stories. Eventually it dawned that we have a pub which was running big screen coverage of the World Cup, sometimes at 6.30 am, which was decked with red white and blue flowers, Union and St George’s flags, and goes by the name The British Queen.

I called in the day before the World Cup started to fix up to do some filming. “ Sorry mate,” says the landlord, “It’s all ticket, regulars only, been sold out for weeks.”

“How many customers want to sit under the screen, unable to see the picture?” I asked. He saw my point. So next morning I was queuing for doors open, with my Canon XM1 (since replaced with XM2) and my Sony PD100 camera, which is great in low light, but doesn’t inter-cut well with footage from the XM1 my wife Annabelle uses. Which is why I too, am a Canon man.

The XM1 isn’t good in low light, and you know, the first thing that happens when you’re going to watch big screen TV is somebody draws the curtains, and switches the lights out!

No problem about the position, I was under the screen on a built in bench. I looked around the room. Half the crowd was in deep shadow, while one single open door to my left streamed sunshine into the place.

I’d gone along to shoot maybe five minutes of the game, for I too, am an avid England supporter, and wanted to dash home to see the rest of the game. Even though I was taping it, nothing beats live action as it’s happening, does it?

The atmosphere was confident and celebratory. I started shooting, general views, pans and sweeps, getting the ambience. A few close-ups as the blokes and girls exchanged happy chat. This is it, they were saying, the World Cup is what it’s all about.

Watching England is never that simple. Indeed, after the recent Slovakia match Gary Lineker reckons it should carry a Government Health Warning.

True enough, as I peered through the viewfinder, the faces in front of me turned from happy and cheerful into stressed out nervous wrecks. It was terrific, and I stayed for the whole 90 minutes.

One guy was so involved his chin started to quiver at one point, and I really thought he was going to have some kind of attack. It made brilliant images, and of course when the goal eventually comes, any footballer or football fan knows the feeling as the crowd goes wild on the mixture of delight and relief.