Just a note before I begin, this article will be written in English, and not American English. I figure since it is titled Diary of an Englishman that the reader can expect nothing less.

Right now I’m sat in my office yawning, in fact I’m struggling to see clearly as the yawns bring tears to my eyes. I’m typing away ignoring my brain prompting me to sleep. Why am I so tired you ask? Not sleeping well James? Or maybe it’s a late night too many partying in the major English cities of Liverpool or Manchester which buzz with nightlife until the early hours of the morning.

Well I’ll tell you that it’s neither of the above reasons, the reason for my frequent yawning is actually my love of boxing. Saturday night came and I had succumbed to the tempting advertisements for the Manny Pacquiao and Joshua Clottey bout.

Now living in a country which shares the same timeline is I have to admit easier to organise, expect for the occasions in which I decide to watch live TV from across the pond. I invited my friend to my house and the both of us sat with excitement as my family gradually made their way to bed, leaving just the two of us at Match of the Day.

For those not common with this, it’s a television show on BBC1 dedicated to showing the highlights of the football (or soccer to most of you) games from the much proclaimed best league in the world the English Premiership.

This began at 10:15pm (22:15) and the boxing show began at 2:00am. So after an hour of mesmerising ball skills I took a look at the clock and realised that I still had close to three hours until the boxing show began and almost seven hours before the main event.

Now I could’ve found an easier way out of this, I have a record facility on my Sky TV box, so I could’ve recorded the fight and watched it with my breakfast the following day. But this feels like cheating, understandably it’s a lot easier for many of you who reign from the USA, but for us poor English folk the twilight hours from midnight to five can prove very dull.

Anyway, I opted that the only thing that would keep us awake were some tortilla crisps and dip and another bottle of the Budweiser I had thankfully remembered to purchase earlier, along with a generous scoop of FIFA 2009 on the Playstation 3 console. After I had recorded several straight victories against my friend boredom had set in and the childish pranks involving dipping our tortillas into various foodstuffs ensued. I think my friend won that battle with his ice cream and curry powder flavour.

So we made our way to my living room to watch the boxing undercard bouts, I went to get two more beers and my friend made his first visit to the toilet of the night, you just know he has begun his toilet to Budweiser ratio now, maximum two bottles per visit was my guess. With our eyes feeling increasingly heavy and the Castillo versus Gomez fight doing little to wake us up we had a three hour battle on our hands to stay awake. If we chose to lie down on the sofa it was practically accepting defeat, so we had to stay perched sat up. The cushions from the sofa were flung across the room at one another when our eyes closed for more than ten seconds.

I never used to be like this, in my teen years I could go the whole weekend without sleeping, but now at the still youngish age of 25 I need my eight hours a day. I know there are probably those reading this much older than me who still have the energy of racehorse when the twilight hours set in but for me sleep becomes appealing between ten and eleven p.m.

Anyway, the fight finally began quicker than expected, more than likely because my friend and I probably fell asleep for much of it, and I began pleading to the Gods for a first round knockout. Now I’m not one for seeing people get hurt, but at that moment in time the appeal of my bed was ringing loudly in my head, almost loud enough to block out the sound of Michael Buffer introducing the two warriors in the ring.

Twelve long rounds later and the fight was done, the Pac-Man recording a lop-sided points victory and the feel that my battle with sleep would’ve probably been called a split decision victory to me.

My friend left to make the short walk home to the sound of the birds in their morning rejoice, and I clambered up the stairs of my three floor home into bed to the very pleasant welcoming arms of my fiancé who allowed me to steal her heat to warm my cold body up. After realising our faces were too close and we were basically breathing in each others air I asked her to turn around and she happily, and sleepily agreed. What a night! Only an hour and a half until my beautiful fourteen month old daughter comes crawling into the room to wake us up.

Revenge however will be mine shortly enough when David Haye takes on John Ruiz at Manchester in England. I’ve bought my tickets and am looking forward to enjoying some quality boxing and being in bed before midnight.

So next time your enjoying a bout from Las Vegas, or New York or the Cowboy Stadium in Texas please just take a minute to think about me and the other Englishmen fighting to stay awake to join you.