And good luck with that, Commish.
It’s little wonder that the NFL wants to re-establish American football in England, going so far as to host a regular-season NFL game in Wembley Stadium next season. NFL Europe has kind of degraded into NFL Germany; all the UK-based teams either folded or moved. If Roger Goodell can get England excited about American football again, he could find a way to bring NFL Europe back to England, or perhaps even establish a new English league that could develop more players.
England is where the money is, of course, but is it where the fans are? Sports fans in that country are much more excited about the variations of football they created. English Premier League soccer has never been bigger, and attendance for Guinness Premiership games has grown consistently in the last five years, though it’s only at 10,000+ per game. How do you convince those fans that Walter Camp’s chess match is more exciting than the games they grew up loving?
Clearly, Goodell’s mission is to establish an international beachhead, but perhaps London isn’t the best place to pull it off. Most Brits love to argue how Association Football is the “real football” because players actually use their feet, while American football is just a descendant of rugby with less kicking and too much stopping and starting, and it’s not very popular outside of America. No doubt, English sports columnists will drag these tired old arguments out again as the London game approaches — not to mention the talk of how David Beckham will be bigger in L.A. than any Manning will ever be in London — and when it’s over, they’ll blather on about getting back to their own football games.
Perhaps Goodell would have more success elsewhere in a country a little more interested. Perhaps Berlin would have been a better choice, given NFL Europe’s success in Germany. Hey, the Germans have a team in the American Football World Cup. So does Sweden, who are officially the European champs of American football. So does Japan, the defending World Cup champs who have 394 high school, college and corporate teams established in that country. Perhaps these are the places where American football would play much better.
And all this, of course, would just be a prelude to the “NFL World Tour,” in which Goodell establishes more developmental leagues and gives them airtime on NFL Network. Think about it — wouldn’t expansion developmental leagues like NFL Japan and NFL Mexico be nice additions next to NFL Germany? Hell, if those leagues take off, maybe the 2011 World Cup will actually mean something.
For now, though, we’ve got a Sunday night in Wembley ahead of us, and playing Wembley is always a big deal. I just have my doubts that the English will show American football that much love. Given the increased freedom of movement among Europeans these days, there may be a lot of Germans and Swedes in that crowd. Let’s just hope for the cameramen’s sake that the Swedish fans are mostly female.
7 responses so far ↓
1 highonlowe // Jan 16, 2007 at 5:11 pm
London is just the first stop in a 5 year series of international games. In 2008, they’ll expand to two games overseas in different countries.
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/9933984
2 iain // Jan 17, 2007 at 9:43 am
hey jerk off
The nfl has a huge following in the UK, he game will be hugely oversubscribed and tickets will be like gold dust.
Why don’t you stick to something you know like doing your sister, instead of perpetuating stereotypes and attempting but failing to be funny.
Douchebag
3 Dave // Jan 17, 2007 at 10:48 am
I’m an only child, actually. But thanks.
4 Billy Briton // Jan 17, 2007 at 11:13 am
ahoy there yankees!
Not sure why Iain felt the need to lay into you there Dave.
I’m English and like the vast majority of my compatriots have absolutely no interest in NFL (I stumbled on here by accident) and believe your article to be pretty close to reality whatever Iain may think.
Yes, the game will sell out. Will it create long term interest in the sport over here though? Nah.
You have your sports and we have ours and thats the way its going to be from now until eternity, which is a shame as baseball is really pretty good!
5 Billy Briton // Jan 17, 2007 at 11:14 am
p.s we dont say Bully
6 Joshua // Jun 24, 2008 at 7:00 pm
In the UK our sports press are usually welcoming to american sports, unlike the american press. NFL London will get a page or two on the day oft he match and thats it.
They won’t insult gridiron as jim rome and other insecure american sports press constantly insult football.
We simply have no interests or need for steroid sports over here.
Gridiron is a dumbed down rugby league, baseball is ours and is only supposed to be played by children.
Football ticks all the boxes needed for a team sport, the other team sports are just for people who weren’t good enough to play football.
NFL Europe lost $850 million and went bust so NFL London is a way to try and get some good publicity.
They used to play one match a year, a friendly, and got the same crowds as playing a real match so I am not sure what progress they are supposed to be making.
The american sports press ignore reality and will keep telling us that gridiron is great and insult football, but reality shows football has won any battle the americans tried to start.
There is one football and only one.
The rest need to take football out of the name of their activities so as to avoid confusion.
7 Dave // Jun 24, 2008 at 10:18 pm
No, Joshua, there’s definitely more than one kind of football, and I’ve got the links in the right-hand sidebar to prove it. You just gotta open your eyes.