WHEN Saturday comes, there is only one thing on soldier Richard Milner's mind -- football!

Despite being thousands of miles away in Canada, Richard still manages to keep up with the latest goings-on at Preston North End by badgering his girlfriend Laura Murray for the results.

The 18-year-old former Our Lady's High School pupil is one of hundreds of soldiers from the Queen's Lancashire Regiment (QLR) currently training at the army's Camp Suffield base, two hours drive from Calgary in Canada.

They are taking part in what is the closest thing to warfare soldiers can experience without actually being pitched against a real opposition.

But instead of using live ammunition, the soldiers are equipped with sophisticated laser equipment.

QLR are playing the role of the 'opposition' in the war simulation and if they are shot by one of the laser guns a computer inside their equipment registers the shot, decides if the shot would have killed them in real life, and turns off their gun -- effectively rendering them useless for the rest of the battle.

Richard said: "It is the best thing I have done since joining the army. It is the closest thing we can get to war without actually being at war and I am really enjoying being over here.

"It is the furthest I have been with QLR in the five or six months I have been with them, although it is very tiring out here."

The attraction of Camp Suffield to the army is the fact that it comes with a 3,000 sq km battlefield made up of a large chunk of Canadian Prairie. It was used by the Canadian armed forces before their infantry dwindled.

The soldiers will spend up to five days out on the Prairie, living in tents and being put under battle conditions.

It makes a return to base and the subsequent access to a phone box all the more special.

Richard added: "I miss my family and girlfriend more than anything and I am always ringing her up.

"She was gutted when I joined the army, but it was the best thing for me and we always speak on the phone.

"I also miss not being at home to know straight away how Preston are doing but it always comes up in conversation with my girlfriend, as long as I have remembered the time difference and not rung at 3am by mistake!"