On a sofa in the corner of a Winnebago motorhome in the TV compound at Old Trafford, Rebecca Lowe is flicking through pages and pages of hand-written notes. “Normally, I don’t do all of this prep on a Friday morning,” says Lowe, who has been the face of U.S.
broadcaster NBC’s Premier League coverage for the past 11 years and has just finished working at the Olympics in Paris. Advertisement “Normally, I do Friday for Saturday, Saturday for Sunday, but because we’re leaving Manchester about 11pm tonight and I’ve got to be in hair and make-up at half-past seven tomorrow in east London, when am I going to do it? So I’ve done Sunday’s already and then I’ll just tweak it as..
. Tim, why are you looking at me?!” Tim Howard, the former Manchester United and USMNT goalkeeper who now works for NBC as a pundit, wants to know what all the fuss is about. “What is going on here?,” he asks.
“Stuart is interested in my notes. Is that a problem for you?” Lowe says. “He’s the only one interested!,” Howard replies.
“Well, at least I’ve got some notes!,” Lowe shoots back. Welcome to NBC’s “Minnie Winnie”, a motorhome where there is nowhere to sleep — what should be the double bedroom is full of a thousand switches that control the broadcaster’s technical operation — and absolutely nowhere to hide. It’s a place for off-the-record punditry — “That’s an insult to the full-back position” — for eating bangers and mash one minute and sus.