Fifa World Cup: Would you travel if your country hasn’t made it?

Originally from Coleraine, Roger Woodend now lives in Philadelphia.

His journey is perhaps shorter than some others, but still involves travelling to a different country – in this instance, Canada – to catch a game.

It has become something of a tradition for him and his friend Alex Logan, who is from Ballymoney, but lives in Scotland.

Both previously visited Brazil for the 2014 World Cup, a tournament that also didn’t feature Northern Ireland, but nevertheless the country has still been represented thanks to the pair’s matching green and white jerseys.

“It is amazing. It’s fantastic. It’s great to see people from all over the world here supporting their team. It’s great to see the Americans embracing it,” Woodend said.

“It’s a really good atmosphere, there’s a real massive energy around the whole place.”

Logan agreed that, while football – or soccer to people in the US – may not be the biggest sport in America, “people are getting into it”.

“It just feels like a proper World Cup atmosphere. I know there’s been a lot of concerns about all sorts of different things, but to me, it’s just a real normal World Cup.”

The first match they went to was Canada v Bosnia-Herzegovina at Toronto Stadium, which would have been one of Northern Ireland’s games.

Woodend said they even bumped into a group of fans who had travelled from Bangor, County Down.

“It’s a shame we didn’t make it. I’m hoping that we’ll make it to the next one.”