'Just Playing Is A Dream Come True' Says Welwyn Hatfield Mosquitos Founder

James Threadgold tells us about being the change he wanted to see in Hertfordshire's American football scene...

With American football growing rapidly across the UK, new teams are springing up all over the place.

One of those emerging groups hoping to enter the fray soon is the Welwyn Hatfield Mosquitos.

You could be forgiven for not being able to point to Welwyn Hatfield on a map – the quaint Hertfordshire town doesn’t make a lot of noise about itself. After struggling to find somewhere to play, 26-year-old health and safety administrator James Threadgold (above, #62), a lifelong NFL fan, took it upon himself to bring football to the sleepy north-of-London wilderness.

In February 2014, he began reaching out to other like-minded people in the area, and managed to rabble around 10 guys to a field for a throw around. The Mosquitos, taking their name from the World War Two aircraft manufactured in the area, were born.

“From there it snowballed, we got more and more people interested, we got more and more people down,” he says. “I had never played before. I absolutely loved American football. I was watching all the games and I just wanted to play. It was that passion of wanting to play, wanting to learn the game with people that are like-minded, rather than annoying my brother or my missus to go over the field and throw a ball. I found some people with the same interest as me and it’s like a new circle of friends. It’s a great opportunity.”

Leaning on help from Hertfordshire University’s team, the Hertfordshire Hurricanes who are based on campus just south of Hatfield, James managed to assemble a group of coaches and arrange weekly training sessions with a group of around 25-30 players.

So far, the team’s only game day experience has come from two friendly scrimmages with the growing and ever-improving Great Britain ladies team, who won the silver medal at this year’s European Championships. After an informal meet up last summer, this July 4th saw the Mosquitos get to pull on their brand new uniforms, donated by a supporter of the team, for the first time. James found this to be a huge landmark.

"It doesn’t matter how exhausted and battered you are if everyone is still smiling at the end of the day. So it was great to see everybody walking off the field looking really, really happy."

“Just seeing them out on the field, in uniform, that was the first moment we thought: ‘wow, if we can get this far, we can really do it’. It was great to get on the field and play our first proper game. We didn’t keep score, purely because we decided we didn’t need it. We were there because we all love playing the game, and were just grateful to have the opportunity to be on the field.

“It was nerve racking, like going into a job interview, but also exciting. Coming off the field afterwards, it was immediately like ‘can we do that again?’ We were knackered physically but we were dying to go again. We have this thing in the team: is everybody still smiling? It doesn’t matter how exhausted and battered you are if everyone is still smiling at the end of the day. So it was great to see everybody walking off the field looking really, really happy.”

The Mosquitos hope to play their associate friendlies over the coming year, and aim to enter the league in 2017. When it comes to on-the-field ambitions, James’ sheer love for the sport becomes truly clear. His voice oozes joy as he discusses the mere prospect of playing competitively.

“Everybody wants to go and win every game, but to even be playing a game, we just want to give it 110% and whatever happens we’ve played, we’ve had fun, and we’re smiling. That, for us, is the dream come true. We won’t be coming off crying if we lose, we’re just going to be happy we got to play.”

Everyone who takes part in American football in this country dedicates an immense amount of time to preparation, conditioning and practice, so that they can go and achieve their goals of glory, but just fielding a team at all takes a lot of hard work off the pitch. For James and the members of every new team, it is a huge achievement in itself.

In a growing league full of such fierce competitors, it’s refreshing to be reminded that just being out there, in a helmet and pads, is often making somebody’s dreams come true.

Photo by Paul Marney. More information about the Mosquitos can be found on their Facebook page.