FYAC Urban Sketching, Fall 2025

August 14, 2026Leave a comment

Last Fall, I was invited to lead a ‘First Year Aggie Connection’ (FYAC) group on campus, under the theme of Urban Sketching. The FYACs are a special program for first year students on campus at UC Davis, offered on a whole range of subjects, and my one was of course all about drawing Davis and the campus. They are a way for first year students to get to know other first years with similar interests and also learn a few things too. It was not a for-credit course, but I did provide handouts with tips and tricks on different themes we’d be covering each week. I selected different places to sketch, and we would just get together, draw them, and then look at all our sketches afterwards. It was nice, very informal, and I was well impressed by all their work. In the very first session, I had them do a portrait party, sketching each other for a few minutes. Here are some of the sketches I did during that quarter.

The UC Davis Eggheads. I made a handout telling them all about the Eggheads and where to find them, and we drew these ones, Yin and Yang, outside the Arts buildings.

On one day it absolutely poured down, so we stood in the shelter of South Hall and drew the big trees outside. The them was trees that week anyway. There is one of the sketchers keeping dry from the rain.

The Bike Barn is always good to sketch, as you know I like drawing triangles. I think the theme was about composition that week, but I didn’t really think too deeply about composition in this sketch.

I did enjoy the week we sketched out at Wyatt Deck, in the Arboretum. That was very peaceful, and I sketched some of the other sketchers.

This was at the Memorial Union, by the campus bookstore. I can’t remember the theme now, probably perspective, but I didn’t have a lot of time to sketch to it was really about adding in a little bit of colour. The point of the course was to explore different places anyhow; many of the students were quite new to Davis. We didn’t really explore away from campus though.

This is Rock Hall, which we drew from the Student Community Center.

This was fun though, on the border between campus and downtown, on A Street. Not ‘a street’, that’s “A” Street. I drew the stop sign, with all the bikes whizzing past ignoring the “Stop” bit.

And this is Hart Hall, which we drew in late November. This was a really fun way to introduce new students to Davis and urban sketching, and I will be doing the same again this coming Fall in another FYAC, but maybe with a few other locations and themes thrown in too.

a brief oregon story

August 12, 20262 Comments

Last October we took a few days away in Oregon, primarily to visit some universities. It had been a little while since I went to Oregon, and it was good to see something more than Portland or Medford, and our first stop was to the city of Corvallis, about an hour or so down from Portland. Corvallis is where the huge Oregon State University campus is located. We were given the guided tour, starting at their enormous football stadium, they are the ‘Beavers’. I was well impressed by the campus, I’m not dissing Davis or anything but it was pretty nice, very well kept. The sort of place I’d like to have been a student. Though I am glad I went to Queen Mary. They have those little delivery robots going all over campus. I had never seen one before! I thought I’d sketched one but I must not have. After we had done the tour the family explored a bit more, and I sketched this big grand building, which I believe is called Weatherford Hall. After looking around campus, we looked about town, finding two very interesting guitar shops. I say ‘very interesting’, it was really just interesting that they had two, always a good sign. Also bookshops. Plus a big river valley that made me start wondering about how often it floods here. Apparently, a moderate risk. I did draw a couple of fire hydrants, which are orange here, just like in Portland, but are a different shape from Portland. It would be a shame if the whole world was all the same.

I also sketched a movie theatre, the Whiteside (made me think of Norman Whiteside, Manchester United player from the mid-80s), which was opposite a big booskhop we spent some time in. They were advertising a showing of the Rocky Horror Picture Show that evening. My family had never seen it, and we didn’t go on this day, but I made them watch it when we got back to Davis. Not sure what they thought of it.

We stayed the night in Salem, the state capital, but I didn’t sketch anything there. We looked around Willamette University the next day, a nice and very old private liberal arts college (in fact it’s the oldest college in the Western US, founded in 1842, so it’s older than Association Football, Marxism, the Telephone, the country of Italy, and every single Hollywood movie ever made. That’s pretty old. Still compared to for example Oxford or Cambridge Universities, it’s a right Johnny-come-lately. Still, it is very very old in American terms. It was very small too, smaller than a lot of high schools here. It didn’t take long to look around, and so we looked about Salem, then headed up to Portland.

It had been a good while since I was in Portland; we stayed on Broadway, and I was saddened to see that Bailey’s Taproom, which I had visited last time I was here, was now a State Farm insurance shop. Voodoo’s Donuts and its long line were still there though, delicious. We had a little look around the Saturday Market, and then I walked along the river and sketched the Steel Bridge. You have to, if you’re in Portland as an urban sketcher. The very first time I was here was for the first ever Urban Sketching Symposium and we had a workshop down here, with Lapin, just drawing the bridge. I sat in between Lapin and Gerard Michel watching their very different styles and approaches, it was one of those formative moments of the whole Urban Sketching thing for me. I also think of Liz Steel when I see this bridge because we joked at the time that this bridge was named for her, and so I always think of her sketch of it when I see it. When I would visit Portland in subsequent years I’d often stay over by the Lloyd Center, and so if I was out downtown at night I would walk back over the Steel Bridge to get back to the hotel, this makes me think of that. I have walked a lot around Portland over the years. After sketching this though I took a walk through Old Town, towards the hotel, and drew a couple of hydrants.

Old Town seemed to be a lot more worn-down than the last time I was here, with many more shops and cafes closed down. I was looking for Floating World Comics, but that was no longer there on NW 4th Ave. I sketched the hydrant in front; I have drawn it before, when it was still painted orange (my old sketch looks pudgier, I think the hydrant lost weight in that time). The other hydrant I drew on NW 2nd (on the left) is very rusty looking, I love sketching that sort of hydrant.

It rained a lot in Portland; “it’s what we do, mate” as Ange Postecoglou would say. I don’t mind at all – more time to spend in Powell’s Books. We did spend a lot of time in there too, exploring everything they had. The rain did ease off so I could draw the shop itself, including the guitarist outside, and the fire hydrant across the street (below). We had been exploring Portland State University that day, but it was a Sunday and it was mostly closed, so we just walked around the campus and the neighbouring area. The leaves were all turning autumnal,

We had some more time that day so drove out to Multnomah Falls, the big double waterfall I had previously only seen in LEGO format (in a display at the airport). I didn’t sketch it, but we took a lot of photos. It was getting late, but our flight was not until quite late in the evening so we went for dinner at one of the McMenamin’s places, I have forgotten which one now. Then we returned the car, and went to the airport where we sat for ages in the lounge while our delayed flight got delayed even further. I was so tired but I managed a few sketches. I really don’t like airports much.

And that was our brief trip to Oregon. Not sure when I’ll be back up that way again but it was good to see some new places.

October 2025 in Davis California

August 7, 2026Leave a comment

And so on to October 2025, sketches in and around Davis. I might have already posted this particular drawing already of the Newman Catholic Center on 5th Street; it was blue but had just been painted a cream colour. Another one of those trees that I like.

This was a house being built on B Street and 7th, it’s probably finished by now. I like these in-progress construction sketches because they will never look this way again. I also liked the colours, red, gold, green, the colours of my dreams, or maybe that was a song.

There’s another from A Street, the corner of 2nd, I didn’t colour it in but this is very ‘start of October’. You’ll have to take my word for it. I like A Street, it’s that liminal space between the Campus and the City, the two worlds of Davis.

Another one from Old North Davis, corner of 6th and B, this is a nice old house. I don;t think it’s in John Lofland’s excellent book on the area, which I do consult a lot. I did learn not too long ago though that John Lofland had sadly passed away, which was sad news; I had never met him, but I really like his book about Old North Davis and the histories of many of the buildings around there. Thank you for the book, and rest in peace. Anyway I drew this while heading home one day and finished it off and coloured it in at home. It always reminds me of the Davis Turkey Trot which usually starts on this very block. I did the 10k again last November, and made the probably foolish decision to try the Half Marathon this year. I may regret that!

This is that place on D Street which was the ‘Secret Spot’ for a while, but is now something else. I drew it when it was pink, it has been other colours. I sketched a lot in early October. I sketched a lot in 2025 in general.

This is the Davis Farmers Market, sketched at one of our monthly ‘Let’s Draw Davis’ sketchcrawls. We have held a lot of sketching events there, there’s always a lot to draw. Here are a couple of sketchers, Suma CM who I have met at several Symposia over the years but never met in California (where she also lives), she was visiting Davis that day. Marlene Lee is also here, she co-organizes Let’s Draw Davis with me. I keep talking about making our group an official Urban Sketchers chapter, join the club proper, but never get around to it.

This is Community Park, near where I live, and it’s the view looking up towards the toilets. On the left is the dog park. I’ve spent a lot of time in this park over the years, with all the soccer coaching and parenting, the Davis World Cup, other big local events, or just passing through on the way home. I appreciate all the parks we have in Davis. It is good to live somewhere with so many parks and green spaces, that isn’t just focused on cars and long long roads that only cars can really use. It’s Community Park because it is really used by the community, and the local library is here, Davis High School is on one side and North Davis Elementary on the other, with Rainbow City playground and the Davis Arts Center up in the other corner. Yeah, a lot of my life and my family’s life has been spent in and around this park alright. I’ve also done a lot of running events passing through here. Yeah I love this park.

This is First Street Real Estate on, well it;s on 1st Street. I like the shape of the building, it’s good to draw. I like triangles and a tree in front, that;s what it all boils down to, if I was an AI which I’m not (let’s make that clear right now) then just a tree with two branches and a triangle behind it, that’s basically most of my drawings. Like the rhythm of a joke, it’s the way you tell ’em. Years ago, I held an art show here, they very kindly hosted me for one of the monthly 2nd Friday Art About events here in Davis. It was one of my favourite ones I have done (also the last, I don’t really do those shows much) and a lot of people came, talked about sketching, sold some prints, and the people hosting were really nice as well.

Ok this will do for the October Davis sketches; I did others, but those were part of the First Year Aggie Connections group that I led during Fall and I’ll post those separately. I also have a bunch from our trip to Oregon. This one though was just before Halloween and Dia de los Muertos, in fact this was specifically for “Dia de los Muertos for Pets”, it’s a little book box and pet treat box, there are dog bowls beneath it, and so on my early evening walk up on the North Davis Greenbelt I stopped and drew it. It was a warm evening. Anyway I had been there about 15 minutes, there were a lot of walkers and cyclists about, when one lady on a bike approached ringing a bell. I was at the side of the path close to the box, not in the way, but she was turning and I think didn’t want to go around the back of me, but bank the corner. At least that’s what I gathered when she got off of her bike and deliberately walked in front of me making me move backwards into the path, grumbling that I am in her way. I said I wasn’t in the way, I was at the side of the path and the ten or so other cyclists had no problem passing by. “You are standing in the middle of the path!” she yelled. “Well I am now, because you just made me move, but I wasn’t.” I had been standing right next to the pet box, as is obvious from the drawing. She went off still complaining that I was in her way and that she had to get off of her bike. It was quite bizarre. As a sketcher I always try not to block any paths, and be considerate of those passing around me. People just having a bad day I guess. I went back to my spot and finished the sketch. Anyway, that was October in Davis. There will be a couple more October posts, then I’ll do all the others, or I might take a break and post the Symposium sketches, and then get back to 2025-2026.

September 2025, Davis California

August 7, 2026August 7, 2026Leave a comment

Alright, alright, alright. Time to catch up, before I start posting all the sketches from the Toulouse Symposium. I am not even halfway through scanning them all yet anyway. As mentioned in this post from June, I have a long list to get through, so let’s get cracking. I might keep the storytelling to a minimum, just look at the sketches and imagine what I was thinking about when I drew them. Let’s take a look at my Davis sketches from last Fall… Above, the opening page of a new sketchbook, and it’s that building on the corner of A Street (that’s “A” Street, not “a street”, I may have made that distinction before but it’s worth repeating) and 1st Street, which used to be a frat house, and at this moment in time it was painted yellow and the name ‘James A Kidd Foundation for the Arts’ was written above the door, for some reason, because shortly afterwards and to this day it is not written there any more. I don;t know what the building is going to be but I see people coming in and out, I don;t really need to pay too much attention to it. I like the shape of the tree in front. This is one of those ‘Fall quarter is about to begin, let’s start ramping things up’ sketches, and it was a busy Fall for me, no doubt. Busy is good, I like busy, but I appreciate the quieter Summer times as well.

Now here is a frat house, or maybe a sorority house, I don;t actually pay that much attention. For someone who prides himself on paying attention to the city and drawing all the changes over the years, being a real ‘interested’ sort of person, I do actually skip over details about what places are for or how things work. I do not, for example, have any idea how fire hydrants actually work, yet if you search for fire hydrants and sketches you’ll probably find me right up there on the lists. Or at least, until AI took over the world. I really like that Jaguar parked there. This was drawn on C Street, next to Central Park, while a Crafts fair was going on. I was talking for a little bit with one of the artists whose stall was nearby, I think they recognised me. I do like September sketches though, there is this ‘late Summer, not quite Fall’ air to them, it’s still hot, it reminds me of the first September I spent in Davis a year after arriving in America. Wow, September 2025, I just remembered, that was 20 years after I moved here. That’s a big deal. I love California, it’s a good place to have spent the majority of my adult years, the grown-up bits of my adult years.

Here’s another one from that week, drawn in the portrait-format sketchbook. This is the Belfry on A Street, I have drawn this building loads of times over the years, it’s an interesting shape and good to sketch.

The corner of 3rd and D, another one I have drawn loads before. Why do I keep sketching these buildings over and over? In case something changes. Something usually does, and then I have a record of it in my sketchbook. It’s like my purpose is to document the world. Maybe I should do a book. I’ve been saying it for years but never get around to it, a book of Davis sketches. I think people would buy it. I probably have a sketch for every day of the year in Davis, like one literally done on each calendar date. You definitely feel the different times of the year here. People say we don’t really have ‘seasons’ like other places do, it;s just summer and then a bit cooler, but it’s not true, the times of the year here are very distinctive, it;s just that summer is very long and very hot.

This was drawn at the Pence Gallery’s annual Art Auction, I sold a couple of pieces there last September. That’s Natalie, the director, speaking to the people at the gala event, and there is one of the musicians. I didn’t draw a lot that evening, just had a glass of wine, some food, looked at all the lovely art, and went home. This in fact was the day I celebrated 20 years in the USA. I thought it was the 26th but it was the 27th. I think a lot about that day.

Another tree in front of another house, this time on 4th Street, that’s Cooper House I believe, but I really like that tree. Maybe I should give a workshop on drawing trees. I have decided I want to be able to identify trees by looking at them, I even bought a box of flashcards with different trees and their leaves on them so I could learn them. Again it’s that thing where I love to draw things but lack that extra detail of knowing what they actually are or anything about them. Like, my mind says, “you’ve draw it haven’t you, that’s enough information for now, draw something else”. I feel like it was like that in Toulouse as well, I looked up the street names later, and am still figuring out the names of the buildings I sketched. Anyway I like these trees that get a kind of orange colour on their bark, it looks good.

Finally, from the same day but sketched after work when I went downtown before heading home, this is at the corner of 1st and E Streets, I like this little house and the way that path leads up to the door. I think it’s a dentists or a realtors, I really don’t know (see what I mean, it’s not like I don’t care what things are, I just like sketching). Next up: October 2025…

Toulouse: two lose in the semi-finals

August 6, 2026Leave a comment

The Longest World Cup Ever is over, at last, and I am done with football for a while. FIFA and its All-Powerful Leader, He-Who-Must-Be-Shown-Onscreen-In-The-13th-Minute-Of-Every-Game, have been very quiet since it ended, nothing controversial happening, very low profile. Maybe this will be the last ever World Cup. It’s just the shirts I like anyway these days. The game itself, well good games are few and far between. Certainly the World Cup Final was one of the most boring games I have ever pretended to enjoy. I am glad Spain won that final, Argentina were about as anti-football a team in that game since the Argentina of the 1990 final, unsporting thugs. I didn’t sketch the Final, as it came at the end of a very very busy Urban Sketching Symposium in Toulouse, and anyway who would sketch that game, better to just paint my page and watch it dry. The Third Place Game between England and France was unmissable but I missed most of it, because those games are usually missable, and besides I was busy. I did however watch and sketch what I could of the Semi-Finals. I will post the Symposium story and my Toulouse and London sketches soon (and then get back to catching up from 2025, by which time it will be 2028 and time for the Euros). For now tough it seems a good moment to close out my World Cup documentation. I arrived in Toulouse on July 14, which we call Bastille Day but the French call the Fête Nationale. They held the fireworks the night before on the July 13, and this night was all about the football. I watched it in a bar right across the street from my hotel, O’Brien’s, with fellow sketche Kalina. It was full of locals dressed in the colours of Les Bleus (ie, blue), some draped in French flags, lots of bières blondes (it was happy hour, buy one get one free), and a lot of nervous anticipation. I was probably expecting more noise and atmosphere, as France had been the most exciting team in the tournament and I fully expected them to win the whole thing with goals and panache, but people were not getting carried away. Not like in 2002, when they were on top of the world and the atmosphere in France was triumphal to say the least (I was living in Aix that year), until they completely flopped in the group stage. It was a bit more like 1998, I was there for the semi-final then as well, watching it at my friend Roland’s apartment, and people did not want to get too carried away, until the final whistle blew and wow, they were actually in the Final, and would play Brazil, in Paris, and boy did they celebrate that night. Well this night felt a bit more like that, but with the opposite outcome. Even at the start, when the national anthem La Marseillaise played on the TV, it was fairly subdued, save a few people singing the rousing part “aux armes, nos citoyens!”. I had been expecting that scene in Casablanca, or even Escape to Victory, but it was more like the opening to All You Need Is Love. It was a quiet game too, France could not lay a glove on Spain, who were a defensive masterclass without being boring. I had to add in a few yells at the screen on my page, but even they didn’t really happen (nobody says “Zut Alors!” in France, except maybe in the Tricolore textbooks). It became clear that France were not getting back into this game, so there was very little edge-of-your-seat tension, and people seemed a bit relieved it was over by the end. At least France have won two World Cups in our lifetimes (or one, based on the ages of many in the bar), so it’s not like with England and their famous ‘Years-Of-Hurt-Ometer’ which has now been reset to ‘At Least 64’). After the game, many left but the bar did not empty and we stayed and sketched and had fun conversations with some locals, and it was nice.

I did watch the second semi-final, of course, as it was England vs Argentina, and yeah, I am disappointed with the result. I missed half of the first half because I was at the Symposium Opening Reception, but ducked out early to a pub called The George and Dragon, which is about as sure a place to watch an England game as you can get in Toulouse. About half the people in there, maybe less, were in England shirts, the rest were either not really watching, or were French but cheering for Argentina, mostly because Messi, or maybe because they wanted to play England in the 3rd Place game, if they cared about that game. Mostly they wee not that bothered. England were winning for quite a while, and then they weren’t, and then it was extra time, and shortly before the end they weren’t winning even more, and I went back to my hotel to get some pre-Symposium sleep. Football is rubbish anyway, it’s only the shirts that I like. The Premier League will be starting again soon, how excited am I, ooh I can’t contain myself.

BYT I drew these on the reverse side of the accordion sketchbook that I drew the USA-Belgium game on, in the previous post. I got that sketchbook in Poznan in the Sympsoium goody-bag, and I don;t really like the bumpy watercolour paper much.

Anyway, I was in France and London recently and I have so many sketches to post. And then after that, catch up with 2025 and the first half of 2026. I can’t stop sketching.

with the crowd on G St, watching the footy

July 11, 20263 Comments

And so, in the end, it was not to be for the US Men’s National Team, commonly called the USMNT (they really need a nickname). Three weeks of hope and glory, days in the sunshine, and definitely maybe. Admittedly a lot of the good feeling had been unnecessarily dampened by the whole red card-suspension-phone call-suspension not-so-mysteriously suspended thing. Belgium were well up for it, in their Magritte-inspired kits, “ceci n’est pas un carton rouge”. In the end, the US players were just not as good as the Belgians, Champions League players against MLS. Maybe the whole unnecessary charade got in their heads, but they were not up for this game, even with the Seattle crowd behind them, who only two weeks ago had seen them swat Australia aside, MLS players against A-League. All three hosts went out in the same round, but not in the same way. Canada punched above their weight but were ultimately undone by the best team in Africa, Morocco; Mexico had a barn-storming game against England at the Azteca in one of the wildest matches in the tournament, loved by both sides, and unlucky not to get a result; the US lost 4-1 with a whimper, even with their new star Balogun on the field. None of the nonsense was his fault, really. A lot of people were not unhappy that the US went out, but it is a shame for all those fans of soccer here, but hey, now you all know what it’s like, “it’s the HOPE that kills ya”, they say, ain’t that the truth. If England are like the Spurs of international football, the US men’s team is like the Crystal Palace (or until Palace started winning things last year), or maybe the Newcastle, but with fewer shirtless fans. I don’t know. I really liked the 2002 team, with big man Friedel in goal, Brian McBride as the American Teddy Sheringham, and the youthful energy ball Landon Donovan (I’m not gonna make any comments about his barnet), plus Alexei Lalas already had retired along with his beard but hadn’t yet discovered the podcast, which hadn’t been invented yet. That was the team I watched with my then-girlfriend-later-wife from California, and they beat the mighty Portugal 3-2 in a super wild game. The USMNT now have some more well-known players, household names over here like Pulisic, and the other ones. That wavy red and white kit was popular, not as popular as that Mexico kit, but a lot of people were wearing it. Maybe they still will, now they have been knocked out, or maybe fans will go back to one of the less see-you-coming-a-mile-off kits.

We watched the game downtown on the big screen at G Street. They have been setting it up for the US games, along with a special Davis Soccer Fest full of activities and music, making use of that public space we have down there now. It’s a good community, Davis, and there are people out there that really make stuff happen like this, and people that are out to support it. I wanted to make sure I was there this time, so we went down and saw that the crowd was about three times bigger than the one for the Australia game a couple of weeks or so before. Was that only two and a half weeks before, it felt like a year, this World Cup has gone on for so long. I can’t remember a time when it wasn’t World Cup. It Has Always Been World Cup. Even when it ends, it will never end, and you might go four years without a bloated money-grabbing morally bankrupt World Cup and you might think that the days of the bloated money-grabbing morally bankrupt World Cup have finally gone and we can all move on to some other sport, when suddenly the bloated money-grabbing morally bankrupt World Cup is back but this time even more bloated and morally bankrupt, but still we eat it up, we love it, because we remember Maradona and Pele and Nobby Stiles dancing. I am sick of World Cup, but I love World Cup. If you want a vision of the future, imagine a football boot stamping on a man’s ankle, forever, frozen in a VAR check that can never be decided. Hydration Breaks, me arse. They are advert breaks, nothing more. If they are going to have them, at least have them at moments like they used to do on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, you know, when Chris Tarrant (or whoever hosted it here) would have them answer a question, final answer, and then say “we’ll find out after the break!” Well the ref should do that when issuing a card, put his hand in his pocket, slow as you like, and then look at the camera and say “see you after the break!”. There was a moment in the France Morocco game when I genuinely thought the ref was going to do that, just as Mbappe was trying to take his penalty, he kept stopping it, and making him wait. Maybe he should have phoned a friend.

But I love the Davis community, coming together to watch the game like this. In my first summer here in 2006 it felt like nobody cared about the World Cup, except for my mate in the football shirt shop, and some of the faculty in our department. The only channels I could watch it on were all in Spanish, and as I didn’t speak Spanish it made it much more interesting, and I picked up some interesting vocabulary (I already knew ‘gooooooooooooooooooooooooool’, of course, but I loved that every time David Beckham would get the ball they would call him “Beckham, El Spice-Boy!” and laugh. It was one of my favourite World Cups, 2006, ending in that amazing Zidane headbutt to end his international career. One of our faculty did not get live TV but had a VCR, so I used to tape the games every day and bring them into him to take home and watch them later, and he’d bring me a tape back each day to do the same. I still have that video tape, in a drawer in my office, and now none of us have VCRs it is a little historical artefact, and one day centuries later someone will find that tape, invent a new VCR to watch it, and wonder why the Mexican commentators kept calling that English player “El Spice Boy”, maybe they will assume he was some sort of galactic spice trader before taking up sports, I don’t know. This is the sort of thing the World Cup brings up, it truly is the beautiful game.

I drew all this while watching the game, but I added in the colours when I got home, because it was quite crowded and I was stood next to a tree and next to my wife. I draw fast and wrote down what I could. We did however go home for the second half, having seen enough, we watched the rest sat on the sofa, and I wrote down some more of the commentary. It was good to be around the fans though, all rooting for the USMNT (they need a better nickname than that). I like sketching big people events like this, especially if they are all dressed in bright colours, and especially if they all stay where they are for a while. Oh well, USMNT, we’ll watch the Women’s team next, at the Women’s World Cup in Brazil in 2027, a nice normal size World Cup of 32 teams, as it should be. This World Cup though will keep on going on, and on, and on, until in the end all that is left are the ants and the dust, and then, England will finally win it. It’s coming home.

You give me FIFA, in the morning, FIFA all through the night

July 9, 2026August 6, 2026Leave a comment

This World Cup has gone on for ages, and we are still not close to being done. As I write the Quarter Final stage is about to begin and this long mind-boggling controversial bloated tournament is finally in the Endgame; France, Morocco, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Argentina, Norway and of course England. A lot of big names have fallen, your Brazils, Germanys, Colombias, Portugals. The three hosts all went out in the same round, Mexico, Canada and the US, and some countries just won over everybody, we are all Cape Verde fans now. Poor old Scotland didn’t get far. They lost to Morocco and Brazil and then had to wait to be told what they already knew, they were Coming Home Too Soon, again. Oh well. I sketched and wrote down words that were coming from the TV for a number of games, too many if I’m honest, but I like to write stuff down and draw in my little brown sketchbook. It’s a fun record, I suppose. A lot of them are just in front of the TV at home. I have watched almost all of the games, somehow, and there have been some exciting classics and some utter slogs In previous tournaments I’ve also sketched players during games all over the page. Anyway without further ado, here are some of the in-game sketches I’ve done.

Uruguay were a bit useless weren’t they. Cape Verde (Cabo Verde) however gained so many fans with their incredible displays, especially their goalkeeper Vozinha. They drew all their group games and took Argentina into extra time in one of the games of the tournament. They also played in a positive and proactive way, not trying to foul the whole pitch up like some teams, and definitely deserved their place here, having topped a difficult group in Africa qualifying. Also, the first U6 soccer team my son played on all those years ago were called the Blue Sharks, and that is also Cape Verde’s nickname. You can see in the foreground the little Messi Lego set I got, an odd build. Messi, well the Ancient One Himself (not as ancient as Ronaldo or Vozinha or Modric or the truly venerable Scottish keeper Craig Gordon) has kept going, kept scoring, kept walking into important areas and broke records, starting with the all-time World Cup goalscorer record which he gained in the 2-0 win vs Austria. I mostly watched that on the iPad at the office, though we have been showing the games on our big screen in our student lounge.

England had a good start, but the game v Ghana was a difficult one. I’ve been overall impressed with England, and they are still in it so, you know, it’s coming home yeah? I sketched this with my England and my Ghana shirt up on the wall. This was held in Boston, and this was not the first time the English were frustrated by a T. Partey in Boston. Haha, I was proud of that one, and can’t believe the commentators didn’t pick up on it. (That isn’t why the England fans were booing T. Partey though, nope.) Still, England topped the group, as expected.

Canada did well this tournament, but not enough to top their group and stay playing games in Canada. They are good hosts. They lost to the Swiss though. I like Switzerland’s manager Murat Yakin, I liked him as a player and he still comes across as cool as a coach. Not a man-crush, but he’s pretty handsome. Out of the world Cup coaches I’d say he is near the top of the handsome league, (with Tuchel probably about mid-table). Montella is a handsome bloke too. Uruguay’s coach with his long hair and distinctively set eyes reminded me of the Beast from the 80s TV show Beauty and the Beast. I’m not doing a league table of football coaches’ looks here, but it has been noted by a lot of people that Poch (my beloved former spurs manager) really looks like Russell Crowe these days. Anyway I sketched this game in our student lounge watching it on the big screen, though unlike World Cup 2022 which was held in November/December, there aren’t really many people around in summer to watch the games.

The Round of 32 started, the first time we’ve had a knockout with 32 teams. World Cups usually start with 32 teams, which makes for easier-to-complete sticker albums. England beat DR Congo, but it was another great game by the Congolese, and I’m a big fan of them as well. Portugal narrowly beat Croatia in the Ronaldo-Modric face off of old Real Madrid team-mates, and Germany managed to get knocked out by Paraguay after some of the worst penalties I have ever seen. Why can’t players take penalties properly any more? Brazil beat Japan, which was a bit of a disappointment because Japan had been a lot of peoples’ ‘dark horses’, plus they had the best away kit, which I bought. It’s so nice. The Japan fans have that reputation for tidying up the stadium afterwards, and the players clean the dressing rooms, and I was wondering if after they lost this time they might have though, sod it let’s just leave it messy, someone else can do it. Mexico beat Ecuador at the Azteca (which wasn’t allowed to be called the Azteca during the World Cup, but tell that to anyone talking about that historic hallowed ground. Mexico, backed up by their loud and loyal fans, easily swept Ecuador aside to set up the Round of 15 game with England. Mexico have been an exciting host in this tournament and you see a lot of those lovely green shirts around here. In the last sketch, Egypt v Australia, with Wolves fan Jacqui Oatley commentating and Warren Barton on co-comms, going on about “moments” and “banging on the door asking questions”. Again we had some bizarre choices in the penalty shootout, this time by Australia, but Egypt got through a knockout game at the World Cup for the first time ever. They ended up going out in the Round of 16 to Messi and Argentina after leading 2-0 until near the end of the game, having been robbed of another goal, I felt very bad for them.

And finally, that incredible and exciting Round of 16 game Mexico vs England, the final game at the Azteca. A huge event, so noisy watching on the telly, knowing loads of people back home would be up all night, and they were not disappointed. Mexico fought so hard and would have been justified getting something from the game, but after all the talk of altitude and fireworks outside the hotel and the massive electrical storm changing the kick-off times, England did really well in the face of a really up-for-it and skillful Mexico, especially the keeper Pickford, and ended up winning 3-2 overall, a proper World Cup classic. Bellingham had a great game. The last time England played a World Cup game at the Azteca was forty years ago, the Hand of God match, I remember it well, as you do when you watch the world Cup as a 10 year old.So England will go on to face Norway and Erling Haaland in the quarter-finals, and well, we will see what happens. But to me it looks a little bit like it’s coming home…

Addendum: This was the last World Cup game I sketched in the little brown book before the semi-finals, France vs Morocco, which my wife and I watched on July 9th over lunch at Pizzas and Pints on the corner of 3rd and B. We had pizza, not pints, except water. And salad. There was a guy in a Mexico shirt, and another guy in a US shirt next to us. Morocco didn’t come close to France, who totally dominated. I was heading to France a few days later, and would watch them in the semi-final on Bastille Day.

“No Pulisic? No Problem!” USA on G Street

June 28, 20263 Comments

“USA! USA! USA!” they were all singing. It was just after lunchtime, the Juneteenth holiday so we had the day off work, and the pedestrianized block of G Street in downtown Davis was full of soccer fans, most of them dressed in USA gear to cheer on USMNT in their group match against Australia. Win this, and they go through to the knockouts. There was a big screen set up, and loads of people on their lawn chairs, which every soccer-mom and soccer-dad has in the back of their car. It was hot, and very sunny, so I sketched under the cover of my hat and some hastily applied sunscreen on the back of my legs, drawing on the last page of my sketchbook which I had pre-splashed with some ‘Inktense’ paints. I had to change positions a couple of times, and then just headed into the shade completely. There were some Australians, but the US were playing in front of a soccer-crazy Seattle crowd and were pretty dominant, even though their Main Man Christian Pulisic was not playing; “No Pulisic, No Problem!” announced the excited commentator. When they scored, a massive cheer erupted, and chants of “USA! USA! USA!” echoed across downtown. I wondered to myself if anyone would start replying “USB! USB!” and thought that might be a good thing to sing at a Chargers game, and then the US got a second goal, scored by someone called A. Freeman, the #16. I thought to myself, they have missed a trick there, A. Freeman should have been Number 6. (As in “I am NOT a NUMBER, I am A. FREEMAN!”). Someone I know (Adie) was wearing an Alexei Lalas USA ’94 shirt, #22, so he had to go into the sketchbook. He had not grown the beard (funny story, right, I actually did grow the beard back in 1999 mostly as a laugh but also partly to annoy someone). I always wanted that kit back in 1994. I did consider wearing the one USA national shirt that I own, the very smart one from 2006, but the thing about shirts from the 2000s is they don’t really work on 2020s Pete. It is curious that my football shirts from the big and baggy ’90s still fit me but nothing from about 2002-2010. Oh well. We didn’t actually stick around for the second half, instead going to McDonalds for some massively overpriced chicken nuggets that came with commemorative World Cup cups with players on them (We got Pulisic and Lamine Yamal). We watched the rest at home, but it was a done deal and the USMNT topped their group with a game to spare in this unusually designed World Cup format. They would go on to play against Turkey and lose late on, but it was a meaningless match, if any game is really meaningless. They will play again in the Round of 32 on Wednesday against Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the big screen will be out on G Street again.

I had gone down to G Street a little early, to check out the Davis Soccer Fest. This has been set up to happen before the US games, and also before the World Cup Final, where there are lots of soccer related activities, including a big dartboard where you can kick a ball at it to score points (I didn’t give it a go but I sketched it). It is organized by Davis community Soccer, who are a new group in town run by many of the same people who have run soccer in Davis for a while now, from the AYSO and AYSO United organizations, of which I was a member; I coached for years and was one of the original coaching team for United but retired in 2022, though I am still on the Davis World Cup committee, and design the World Cup logos and medals. Davis Community Soccer started this year, though it was a surprise to me (since it is effectively replacing Fall AYSO this year, though Davis AYSO has said it’s not going away) and I’ve not had a chance to talk to anyone involved about it all yet, but good luck to them, I hope it’s a success. I like their logo, it reminds me of the one I designed for the 2022 Davis World Cup a bit, I like that retro font. It’s nice to see them create fun stuff like this as well, and so as I sketched I did get a chance to chat with Sam and Adam who I’ve not caught up with in a while. They had a tent pitched up where kids could get soccer tattoos. It was a really fun event for kids, with others playing soccer tennis further up the street.

Here are some more of the crowd. I drew the USA fans there while I was stood in the shade on the sidelines. That reminds me, the USA will celebrate its 250th anniversary this July 4, I don’t know if you heard. I may actually try to sketch the fireworks this year, to mark the occasion, I will need some more gel pens to sketch on dark paper. While 250 doesn’t seem that old to a Brit, it’s worth getting a nice cake for, and I never liked it when I would turn 30, 40, most recently 50 and there is always someone older going, hah you’re so young, wait until you’re my age. For July 4 I might even try to squeeze into that 2006 USA shirt if I can. Below, some of the other shirts on display, a Scottish fan in a kilt waiting, Scotland were playing later that day (spoiler alert, they lost the game, but they won over the city of Boston, and that’s what really matters). There was a young lad in the 2002 Brazil shirt, I think he was a USA fan but that’s a great top. The guy next to him was in a red USA away kit from about 2011, that was a nice one. There were a lot of other kits on display, but overwhelmingly the current USA home kit was most common, the one with the red wavy horizontal stripes like a flag. Will they win it this year, the actual World Cup? I mean, nobody really thinks so, because they just don’t do they, but well, they could. Their group was not hard, and their route to the quarter finals is not exactly filled with heavyweight teams, and with the big West Coast crowds chanting “USA! USA!” (except for those few confused LA Charger fans singing “USB-C!”) they just might pull it off. The Women’s team have done it enough times. If they do, well it’ll be ‘Hydration Breaks’ everywhere. Maybe when they have won ‘FIFA’ as they call it, they can get rid of penalty shootouts and replace them with that thing they used to do in the early years of MLS, when they would have someone run from the halfway line to go one on one with the keeper, the best Americanization sport has ever seen. But that won’t happen because as we all know deep down, this year, 60 years on, Its Coming Home.

Watching Haaland in Soccer and Lifestyle

June 28, 20261 Comment

The World Cup continues. Still during that first round of group games, I went to the local football shirt shop, Soccer and Lifestyle, to watch the second half of Norway vs Iraq. I sketched the store; the last time I had sketched inside was in the previous location was also during a World Cup, but back in 2014, twelve years ago. That is a long time ago. I drew this all while the game was going on, but coloured it in at home. There was a woman in there wearing a yellow and green Mali shirt, with ‘F Kanoute’ on the back, which I though was incredible. I really liked Freddie Kanouté, who played for Spurs for a brief period in the mid 2000s, and I told them I actually saw him play and even score, at White Hart Lane in 2004. There are a lot of good shirts in that shop. I bought my shirt for the tournament there, the Japan away kit, a couple of weeks ago. That one is white with a black collar but has really nice colourful pinstripes. They were out of the USA shirts already, they had sold out before the first USA game. There is a ‘Soccer Fest’ on G St before every US game, and a big screen is set up to watch them. We saw the second game there (I’ll post the sketches later). The USA home shirt this year is a zany affair, red and white made to look a bit like the flag waving, and be reminiscent of the amazing 1994 kit. I don’t like the 2026 one much, but if they do well, it’ll probably end up iconic. The game that I saw in the shop was a bit one-sided, with Norway being the one side, not surprising since Haaland is on the team.

So, flashback to twelve years ago, watching France vs Switzerland…

Hop you are enjoying the World Cup. It’s big and bloated and there are too many games, and I hate the ‘hydration breaks’ which are just blatantly obviously advert breaks (well done America, you broke soccer), but there have been some good moments already. Messi closed out the group stage with goal #6 for him, and DR Congo won their first World Cup game (against Uzbekistan admittedly) to qualify for the knockouts. The ‘Round of 32’ started today, and Canada beat South Africa with a late winner. There are a lot of games still to come, a lot of ‘hydration breaks’, a lot of Beckham and Messi adverts…

World Cup on the box

June 26, 2026Leave a comment

Summer is here already. As I write, we are already two weeks into the biggest World Cup ever. That is, the biggest FIFA World Cup ever, because the Davis World Cup as we know has more teams and games and a much better logo. In case you haven’t heard, it’s being held in North America, co-hosted by the USA, Canada and Mexico, who’ve all been getting on great the past couple of years. There is a lot of noise around this World Cup, even more than the last ones, and as a blatant massive cash-milking machine it’s made me feel very uneasy and I definitely didn’t want to spend thousands going to any of the games, just to watch a dead-rubber 0-0 (I’m looking at you, Paraguay v Australia in Santa Clara). Despite all that, I’ve been a sucker for the World Cup since I was ten, watching Maradona and Lineker and Platini and JOSIMAAAAAR at the 86 World Cup. I’ve watched almost all of the games so far (I had to give some of them a miss, looking at you Australia v Paraguay), and I have a lot of complaints, none more than these bloody ‘hydration breaks’, but also the head-to-head rule, the far-too-many-teams thing, and the amount of adverts with Beckham in them. I’ve enjoyed a lot of the games, I have all the flags up, I got a new shirt as per tradition (Japan Away), and even got the Panini sticker album, why not. I made a massive wallchart, one for home and one for work, and made little plastic flag ornaments to hang up and take down once teams get eliminated. Time to start doing that, because teams are dropping out now like British Prime Ministers. I have done a fair bit of sketching this time, but not drawing the players , it’s the old ‘draw the TV and some of the room’ with lots of random bits of commentary written all over the place. I wasn’t going to do that so much this year, but I can’t help myself. On the first Saturday while watching Morocco vs Brazil, a big game this early, I thought I’d get playful and use that big box of Prismacolor pencils I have had for a few years but never use. And why not draw on the back of a cereal box, like I saw so many sketchers doing in Poznan last year (those who took Peter Rush’s workshop), so I got a book of Raisin Bran Crunch and sketched the World Cup, definitely not sponsored by Kellogg’s. Yeah, bit of a slog, and having to keep changing pencil, what a time waste. Still it was a fun outcome, maybe. The game was good too, and ended in a 1-1 draw.

Before the World Cup started, we all made our predictions, our tips for the golden boot, and our dark horses. I predicted France to win it (with Spain and yes England as my 2nd and 3rd tips), and Harry Kane for the top scorer award. Morocco were my dark horses, with Norway and Japan as my other “who knows”. So far that’s been playing out, except that guy Messi is scoring for fun still despite turning 39 this week. It’s been interesting watching some of the ‘smaller’ teams, and the countries you don’t usually get to watch. Curaçao were fun, Uzbekistan a little less fun, though everybody fell in love with Cape Verde (Cabo Verde) and their keeper Vozinha when they drew with Spain, and then again with Uruguay. My African team this time though is DR Congo (and yes I do keep saying Doctor Congo), big fan of them and their superfan, Lumumba Vea. Above though I sketched New Zealand vs Iran, which was another entertaining draw. I drew that on the same cereal box, but this time in a blue Marabu Aqua Pen Grafix marker I must have gotten at one of the Symposiums. I used my usual and more trusty Staedtler aquarelle pencils for the action on TV, and the flags. which are hung around my living room.

And here is the first game by England, an adventurous effort for them, beating Croatia 4-2. Croatia are finally tired after 2018. We were all at home that afternoon, I sketched on the iPad this time, just in the second half. My old 2010 England away shirt, the only one I ever owned (and it is a bit tight on me now), is hanging up on the wall. I have a funny relationship with the England team because I both support them and don’t support them, it’s one of those things where both can be true; when I was a teenager, Ireland were my team, but I suppose England after that, and they usually ended up letting me down. I also never liked ‘that’ element of the supporters, but I know they ain’t all like that. I find that I don’t get excited for England, until the game is actually on, and then I just get my lack of excitement from the way the team plays. Maybe this time it’s different? I always want the British and Irish sides to do well, and so I’ve been well into Scotland this time around. I even bought a Wales shirt, because they went half price after they failed to qualify. I know what will happen with England, I’ll get sucked in as they go along, and Kane starts doing well, and then they get to a point where you think, maybe, maybe this time? You remember those times when you didn’t just roll your eyes about them and you start thinking, is it coming home? It is isn’t it, it’s coming home, it definitely is this time. England are the Spurs of international football, maybe for once they can just give us something. And then they lose a semi, or a quarter, and you feel grumpy and dejected for ever believing, and the years-of-hurt-o-meter keeps on ticking. At least the Women’s team win stuff. This time though, they look…good? They did in this game, a good start, let’s see how it goes, we might just be too exhausted to care by the end. It is a long, long, long World Cup…