Hello and welcome to the season preview edition of Inside the Huddle. Week one of the 2011 campaign kicks off on time on Thursday night with the New Orleans Saints at the Green Bay Packers. Joining me to look ahead to that clash and to the upcoming season, Mike Carlson of Channel 4 and the BBC. And Mike, we've got a studio. Look at us. Yeah, it's pretty sophisticated for us. I think we're, apparently, rumor has it. We're getting jingles this year as well going forward, not right now. Oh, I thought you meant jingles was Andy Devine. It was Wild Bill Hickok's sidekick on TV when I was a kid. You've lost me already. Wait for me, Wild Bill. 35 seconds into the new season. All right. And I'm lost.

We're going. Also, congratulations on the Sky gig. Thank you. Any words of advice? Get a wig. Yeah. Stick to radio. You've got the face for it. No, it should be good fun. Mike, you've been in the US in the summer. I was at Bears and Buccaneers training camp. Do you sense fan hunger for this season?

Because it was almost a season that wasn't?

Yeah.

In a way, you know, people followed the negotiations, the way you would follow the offseason because it was the only thing there.

And to an extent, I think, made more of it than it really deserved.

Because honestly, and I think we said this a couple of times, I really never doubted seriously that they wouldn't come to terms and get – because it was just too much to lose. It's too successful. The game is going too well. And in the end, although a lot of major things were changed by the CBA, the basics of how contracts work and how teams are put together stayed pretty much the same. That's one of the big strengths of the NFL.

And what's happened now is everyone's given the exhibition season far more importance that it deserves, especially this year because it's much, you know, it's much more chaotic than it

usually is, and rosters are just changing with such rapidity. It's hard to keep up and it's really

hard to predict what's going to happen in the first week because really teams themselves don't

know what they've got. That's bad news because that's what we're going to try and do, Mike.

As you mentioned, Thursday night, Sky Sports 2 from 1 o'clock, it's all about me making my debut for Sky. But aside from that, there is a game as well. There's the Saints and the Packers. And what a game it is. I mean, this is, I think it could be an NFC championship game preview. Obviously, there's a long way to go until we get to that stage in January. But two elite teams are we looking at here?

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

I think I wrote last week on the NFL UK website.

You know, the NFC is having a sort of renaissance in terms of the best teams.

And these were two of the three.

I think Atlanta could join that group potentially and be a really strong team, which will make

it harder for the Saints to repeat.

But the Packers are young.

They're coming off a Super Bowl win.

They're probably a better team on paper this year because they've got Ryan.

They've got Ryan Graham, Jim Michael Finley back.

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