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The influence of pro sport upon Spike Lee as both a man and a filmmaker has been well-documented, and is richly confirmed by his very latest movie project with Kobe Bryant. But did you know of Lee's consuming passion for English soccer? His biographer Kaleem Aftab has witnessed it at close quarters, and shares this close-up portrait of an unlikely 'Gooner', taken in London on the night of April 3 2008.

Spike Lee and I are sitting in a limousine on the way to the Emirates Stadium in north London, there to watch Arsenal Football Club's biggest game of the 2007-08 season. It's the European Champions League quarter-final first-leg tie against Liverpool FC. After Lee sent me a text that morning asking me to the match I had to make a hasty change of plan for the evening: I couldn't believe my luck. For him, tonight's entertainment is a detour on his trip back to New York from Rome, where he's been recording five lines of ADR for his upcoming Italian World War II picture Miracle at St Anna.

Lee's love affair with basketball — specifically the New York Knicks — is well known. The book Best Seat in the House (Crown, 1997) recounts his remarkable descent from being a kid in the cheapest seat in the roof of Madison Square Garden to his current premier position in the most expensive courtside spot. Of course, movie stars watching basketball games are now almost as much a part of the event — or the increasingly important TV spectacle — as the players themselves. Lee, though, gets immense pride out of being to the Knicks what Jack Nicholson is to the L.A Lakers.

But above all Lee is a sports fan, and when he's outside the US English football is his game of choice. Arsenal — to whom he loves referring by the popular fan's moniker 'The Gooners' — are his team. Tonight as he chats effusively about their starting 11 he's proudly sporting the club's latest replica shirt. Even as we sit stuck in London traffic, Lee's excitement at his first visit to their massive new stadium is writ large on his face. So I'm surprised when he mentions that only last night he was at the Roma v Manchester United game — 'Man U' being Arsenal's chief adversary in the English league for the last decade.

Football is not just governing Lee's playtime: as well as attending matches he is assistant coach to his son's soccer team. And 'the beautiful game' is now inspiring his film career too. 'I'm going to shoot a documentary on Kobe Bryant this weekend', he tells me casually. 'It's going to be in the style of the Zidane film?'

Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait (2006, dir. Douglas Gordon & Phlippe Parreno) was made in the same style as 1962's Garincha, Alegria do Pova (Garincha: Joy of the People, directed by Joaquim Pedro do Povo) and Helmuth Costard's George Best: Soccer as Never Before (1970). In all three films the camera tracks a sole player on the football field with the single-minded determination of a groupie trying to snag a rock star; the lens never veers away, even when said player doesn't have the ball. Zidane departed from its antecedents by featuring a musical score by the Scottish band Mogwai; Costard was content with the natural ambient noise of the stadium.

'I think basketball is better suited to this type of film than football', enthuses Lee. 'The players have more touches of the ball, they're more involved in points-scoring. We're going to have 15 cameras on Bryant during the game and the lead cameraman is going to be Matty Libatique. But I'm not just going to show Bryant on court — I'm going to start filming him from his home, and we're going to follow him as he goes through his pre-match ritual. We've even got permission from the league and [Lakers manager] Phil Jackson to go into the dressing room at half time.'

As Lee is painting his vision it dawns on me that I'm getting to observe a celebrity fan go through his own pre-match ritual. Next, Spike wants a low-down on how the Arsenal players have been performing recently. Despite the departure of his friend and Arsenal goal-scoring legend Thierry Henry to Barcelona, Spike has stayed familiar with the new signings and the current crop of players. I must admit I'd thought that once Henry left Arsenal, Lee would stop being such a keen supporter, but like every true fan he's put his club before the individual. I'd done him a disservice, forgetting that years of practice watching the Knicks under-perform must have got Spike used to sporting disappointment.

The traffic is a bottleneck so we decide to walk the final mile to the stadium. Outside this impressive 60,000-seater we're greeted by Arsenal staff and are given a tour of the immaculate new facilities. I get chills up my back as we walk through the players' tunnel, past the Arsenal and Liverpool team crests, into the middle of the pitch. An hour before kick-off the stadium is only just starting to fill, but out there one gets a rush of adrenalin that must be some fraction of that which courses through the players just before they enter the fray.

The recent purchase of Manchester United by the Glazier family and of Liverpool by Tom Hicks and George Gillett — owners of prominent American sporting franchises — has highlighted the sudden influx of interest in English football from across the Atlantic. In US sports the importance of celebrity fans has been recognised for quite some time and now it seems that English Premier teams — especially the dominant 'big four' of Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea — are fighting it out to officially be the so-called 'F.C Hollywood'.

We retire to the Players Lounge where Spike has to do a brief interview that will appear in the next Arsenal match-day program. In all the time I've spent with Spike, he's never more relaxed and content than when he's at a big game. He tells the club reporter about the game in Rome last night but is quick to add — like any real Gooner — that he hates Man U and was supporting Roma. (It's all reminiscent of the baiting Jon Savage gets in Do The Right Thing for wearing a Boston Celtics shirt in Brooklyn.) I laugh aloud, and the reporter admits he's not allowed to print fan badinage of that ilk in the official program.

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The influence of pro sport upon Spike Lee as both a man and a filmmaker has been well-documented, and is richly confirmed by his very latest movie project with Kobe Bryant. But did you know of Lee's consuming passion for English soccer? His biographer Kaleem Aftab has witnessed it at close quarters, and shares this close-up portrait of an unlikely 'Gooner', taken in London on the night of April 3 2008.

Spike Lee and I are sitting in a limousine on the way to the Emirates Stadium in north London, there to watch Arsenal Football Club's biggest game of the 2007-08 season. It's the European Champions League quarter-final first-leg tie against Liverpool FC. After Lee sent me a text that morning asking me to the match I had to make a hasty change of plan for the evening: I couldn't believe my luck. For him, tonight's entertainment is a detour on his trip back to New York from Rome, where he's been recording five lines of ADR for his upcoming Italian World War II picture Miracle at St Anna.

Lee's love affair with basketball — specifically the New York Knicks — is well known. The book Best Seat in the House (Crown, 1997) recounts his remarkable descent from being a kid in the cheapest seat in the roof of Madison Square Garden to his current premier position in the most expensive courtside spot. Of course, movie stars watching basketball games are now almost as much a part of the event — or the increasingly important TV spectacle — as the players themselves. Lee, though, gets immense pride out of being to the Knicks what Jack Nicholson is to the L.A Lakers.

But above all Lee is a sports fan, and when he's outside the US English football is his game of choice. Arsenal — to whom he loves referring by the popular fan's moniker 'The Gooners' — are his team. Tonight as he chats effusively about their starting 11 he's proudly sporting the club's latest replica shirt. Even as we sit stuck in London traffic, Lee's excitement at his first visit to their massive new stadium is writ large on his face. So I'm surprised when he mentions that only last night he was at the Roma v Manchester United game — 'Man U' being Arsenal's chief adversary in the English league for the last decade.

Football is not just governing Lee's playtime: as well as attending matches he is assistant coach to his son's soccer team. And 'the beautiful game' is now inspiring his film career too. 'I'm going to shoot a documentary on Kobe Bryant this weekend', he tells me casually. 'It's going to be in the style of the Zidane film?'

Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait (2006, dir. Douglas Gordon & Phlippe Parreno) was made in the same style as 1962's Garincha, Alegria do Pova (Garincha: Joy of the People, directed by Joaquim Pedro do Povo) and Helmuth Costard's George Best: Soccer as Never Before (1970). In all three films the camera tracks a sole player on the football field with the single-minded determination of a groupie trying to snag a rock star; the lens never veers away, even when said player doesn't have the ball. Zidane departed from its antecedents by featuring a musical score by the Scottish band Mogwai; Costard was content with the natural ambient noise of the stadium.

'I think basketball is better suited to this type of film than football', enthuses Lee. 'The players have more touches of the ball, they're more involved in points-scoring. We're going to have 15 cameras on Bryant during the game and the lead cameraman is going to be Matty Libatique. But I'm not just going to show Bryant on court — I'm going to start filming him from his home, and we're going to follow him as he goes through his pre-match ritual. We've even got permission from the league and [Lakers manager] Phil Jackson to go into the dressing room at half time.'

As Lee is painting his vision it dawns on me that I'm getting to observe a celebrity fan go through his own pre-match ritual. Next, Spike wants a low-down on how the Arsenal players have been performing recently. Despite the departure of his friend and Arsenal goal-scoring legend Thierry Henry to Barcelona, Spike has stayed familiar with the new signings and the current crop of players. I must admit I'd thought that once Henry left Arsenal, Lee would stop being such a keen supporter, but like every true fan he's put his club before the individual. I'd done him a disservice, forgetting that years of practice watching the Knicks under-perform must have got Spike used to sporting disappointment.

The traffic is a bottleneck so we decide to walk the final mile to the stadium. Outside this impressive 60,000-seater we're greeted by Arsenal staff and are given a tour of the immaculate new facilities. I get chills up my back as we walk through the players' tunnel, past the Arsenal and Liverpool team crests, into the middle of the pitch. An hour before kick-off the stadium is only just starting to fill, but out there one gets a rush of adrenalin that must be some fraction of that which courses through the players just before they enter the fray.

The recent purchase of Manchester United by the Glazier family and of Liverpool by Tom Hicks and George Gillett — owners of prominent American sporting franchises — has highlighted the sudden influx of interest in English football from across the Atlantic. In US sports the importance of celebrity fans has been recognised for quite some time and now it seems that English Premier teams — especially the dominant 'big four' of Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea — are fighting it out to officially be the so-called 'F.C Hollywood'.

We retire to the Players Lounge where Spike has to do a brief interview that will appear in the next Arsenal match-day program. In all the time I've spent with Spike, he's never more relaxed and content than when he's at a big game. He tells the club reporter about the game in Rome last night but is quick to add — like any real Gooner — that he hates Man U and was supporting Roma. (It's all reminiscent of the baiting Jon Savage gets in Do The Right Thing for wearing a Boston Celtics shirt in Brooklyn.) I laugh aloud, and the reporter admits he's not allowed to print fan badinage of that ilk in the official program.

Main duties discharged, Spike collects the match tickets that he's bought at a fraction of the price he pays for his prized Knicks seats. But before we take our positions he has one more obligation/ritual he must fulfil — a voyage around the official Arsenal club shop. It's called The Gunnery and I'm struck by its size, more suited to a sprawling suburban shopping mall than a football ground. Spike is after new merchandise, especially items he might not be able to get in New York. Top of his list — something that he's been banging on about for the whole journey — is to procure an Arsenal scarf. I try to persuade him to buy the classic red-and-white vertical-block stripes with cannon motif. But Spike wants something that says 'Arsenal' on it.

We walk through the turnstiles and grab a coffee in the busy forecourt — where Spike starts to get recognised, fans pushing their official match programs his way to be signed. The immense joy it gives Arsenal fans to call one of the world's most recognisable film directors a fellow Gooner is a touching sight. Thereafter I glean from him a few more details on the Kobe project, for which he hopes to snag 'a limited cinema release' before it plays on ESPN. 'Bruce Hornsby is going to do the music', says Spike. Those who know Hornsby only for 1980s chart hits such as 'The Way It is' might be surprised, but Spike admires Hornsby's formidable musical abilities and has used songs of his in Clockers and Bamboozled.

Our seats are five rows behind Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger, overlooking the halfway line. 'This is much better than Roma', Spike enthuses. 'We're far closer to the action. In Rome you're up in the clouds.' Thus speaks the director, looking for the best angle on proceedings. The game kicks off in a charged atmosphere, and Arsenal quickly take the lead. It's going to be a beautiful night for Spike's team… Then Liverpool quickly equalise. At half-time Spike seems stoked to receive a text alert from the Knicks' fan service informing him that coach Isiah Thomas has been relieved of his duties. Back at the Emirates the second half is a tense affair and for all Spike's increasingly loud encouragement no further goals are scored.

After the final whistle we're allowed to go and stand in the exclusive players' area, and once they emerge from the changing rooms we have the chance to converse with them. (England national team manager Fabio Capello stands a few yards away.) Spike is clearly obsessed with all aspects of a player's psychological make-up and it's clear why he'd want to follow Kobe Bryant home; he doesn't feel like the game has quite ended as long as players are being asked to do press interviews and remain under the spotlight. Perhaps this comes from his long experience of having to do press for a film long after its sound has had a final mix.

It transpires that Arsenal goalkeeper Manuel Almunia is a huge fan of World War II films, most particularly Saving Private Ryan. On the rare occasions he has a weekend off, he drives to famous battle locations. Almunia is clearly excited to hear of Lee's new project, and Spike explains that it will be 'an epic', about 'the Buffalo Soldiers of World War II. It's going to come out in October — hopefully it'll have a premier at the Venice Film Festival, if they accept it.' He runs through the cast-list. The first test screening of Miracle is set to take place in a couple of weeks and Spike is as excited as I've ever seen him about a film.

Moments later Matt Damon enters the room, in the company of director Paul Greengrass with whom he's currently shooting a film in London about weapons inspectors in Iraq. Damon's Boston upbringing ensures that talk quickly turns to the traditional rivalry between the Celtics and the Knicks. But this sudden concentration of the Hollywood A-list in north London is further proof of the growing appeal of football, and the infatuation so many film stars have for sportsmen — especially those who perform in the world's largest theatres.

Spike is hoping to have a word with Arsene Wenger. At the last match we attended together Wenger told Lee about his fascination with the teamwork of basketball players and his admiration of Phil Jackson. And Spike has a special admiration for managers — I suspect he sees their role as being very similar to that of a film director, trying to get a team of talented individuals to work together for a collective goal. But tonight Wenger is too engrossed in his own post-match duties, so Spike simply leaves a good luck message for the rest of the season. As we take our leave of the Emirates Spike's mind is already travelling ahead of him — to the coming weekend, the Staples Centre in Los Angeles, and the demanding task of keeping up with Kobe Bryant.