Leon Osman is everywhere.
He's practising his baseball skills with US-based Everton fans at the club's training base, throwing the ceremonial first pitch at the home of the 2019 World Series champions, the Washington Nationals, and playing NFL with a Baltimore Ravens legend on the turf of the M&T Bank Stadium.
After the Blues' game with Arsenal he was pitch-side again, taking selfies accidentally photobombed by this reporter. Before the game he could barely move for people asking for pictures with him as he passed through the Gameday Firehouse where hundreds of supporters gathered ahead of the match. This week he will meet more fans as the club moves on to Minnesota.
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Just like Osman, there were Blues supporters everywhere in Baltimore on Saturday. After the calm of Washington DC, where the only sign of the club's presence was the sight of the odd player and staff member (including Osman again) on electric scooters in the upmarket streets around their hotel, Charm City was riotous. The popular harbour area of the city was flooded with Royal Blue shirts on Saturday morning.
The game soon stopped becoming spot the Everton fan and developed into checking out the names on the back of the shirts - a collection as varied as Stephen Naismith, Ross Barkley, Romelu Lukaku, Alex Iwobi and Lewis Gibson. At 9am the focus of attention was not the harbour but Latrobe Park, where Everton supporters gathered for a game of football in heat that soon became oppressive. The game was organised by fan group the Baltimore Toffees and backed by the club, which sent shirts for those who turned up. Anyone on Merseyside with doubts about the passion of Blues in the US can be reassured they follow Everton with intense pride - on display from the park to the M&T Bank Stadium.
Saturday night's game was like few others the players will have experienced. The US national anthem was sung to a backing track of fireworks sparking from the roof of the stands, there was an overhead fly-past and the starting line up emerged from the players' tunnel separately from Arsenal's and walking through the billows of a smoke machine. The sound of Z-Cars and the blue pyro may have helped pull them back to reality.
Watching the match from the press box was completely different in Baltimore than anywhere in the Premier League - the media viewing from desks placed inside the ground are separated from the atmosphere by glass. The 'team roster' - essentially the squad list - greeted those in attendance and was the first team sheet to ever include Anthony Gordon under his new shirt number. In what I am assuming is a feature of US sports, or at least Ravens' games, another interesting element was the announcements of a PA who, every time there was a throw-in, corner or foul would say who it was for - and often which player had conceded it. He was also prone to random stat announcements, including: “Three shots for Arsenal, one on target. Zero shots for Everton.”
It was unclear whether this was just for the benefit of the press or the whole stadium - most probably the latter as Niels Nkounkou's burst forward and effort on target served as an almost immediate riposte. Saturday's game was more about fitness than form and more about giving thousands of US Blues an opportunity to see their side in action and come together - which they did with wonderful enthusiasm.
After the game Everton returned, via coach, to Washington DC. Amid the sounds of the crowd dispersing into the Baltimore night the players - treated to such incredible coach greetings at the end of last season - may not have heard their latest send off. Those looking on certainly did, as someone blasted Z-Cars from a street-side speaker. The squad will start the week in the DC hotel that has remained their base for the trip before heading more than 1,000 miles north west to Minneapolis where Blues legend Adrian Heath, manager of next opponents Minnesota United, awaits.
Along with more events for Osman to enjoy.
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