Kerry is ready to go on the attack

"That humility comes along with realising that I do have a problem, and I can't control alcohol. Unless I realise that and unless I apply that into my daily life, then alcohol will eventually kill me, or I'll end up in jail."

America likes and forgives those who admit their failings and try to do something about them. TV showed the interview over and over and the man who entered a rehabilitation clinic and hasn't touched a drop for 21 months became a Super Bowl hero before a ball has been thrown.

He's already a hero to his teammates after a record-breaking dis-play against the Minnesota Vikings in the NFC Champion-ship game. His statistics included five touchdown passes in a 41-0 rout which booked the Giants' passage to the Super Bowl.

He took the Panthers the same distance in his second season, but they lost the NFC title game and after that things began to fall apart on a personal level.

Collins admits to making the racial slur when he was "very intoxicated" while out drinking with team-mates, including black players, during a Panthers training camp though he said it was only meant in jest. But word got around and it didn't go down well with the team.

Then, in 1998, came a day when the words came out all wrong again. His attempt to explain to his head coach Dom Capers of his struggles with the responsibilities of his position became the day when he so-called "quit" on the club.

He was dropped by the Panthers and picked up by the New Orleans Saints, who in turn dumped him.

But New York saw something in him and gave him a third chance, giving him a $16.9 million (£11.8m) contract with $4.8m of that up front. Sunday is payback time when, having put down all the baggage in his life, Collins can complete the journey to the Super Bowl against the Ravens.

Baltimore have the best defence in the NFL and they are currently being labelled the best defence ever in the NFL.

That is making them the bookies favourites to win, but they will have seen the film of that 41-0 Giants victory over the Vikings which showed just how good New York are on offence.

Baltimore's arrival at the Super Bowl, however, is as good a story as Collins's.

They used to have a successful team, the Colts, until their owner moved the club to Indianapolis in 1984 in the NFL's strange ritual which allows teams to leave one town and set up in another, leaving fans without a club to support. Cleveland Browns owner Art Modell did the same thing to his city's fans in 1996 when he moved to Baltimore, only on this occasion the NFL did step in and told him he couldn't call his club the Baltimore Browns.

The Browns name and history stayed in Cleveland until the NFL allowed a new Browns club to be formed in 1999.

Thus the Ravens were born and it is some success story for a team who are only five years old and before this year hadn't had a season when they had won more games than they had lost, didn't even win their division this year and only qualified for the playoffs as a wild-card team.

Baltimore have been brash all week while New York have been quiet and I think the Giants will sneak up on the Ravens to win.

Collins would drink to that, but only water.