The National Football League has announced a partnership with the Rugby Football Union (RFU) that will see the league play a minimum of three regular-season games at Twickenham Stadium in London over a three-year period.
http://www.nfluk.com/news/internationals...eb7d7f3ebc
This is the 3rd London venue to be announced to host games. In 2018 Wembley (84,000 for NFL games), Twickenham (82,000) and Spurs Stadium (61,000) will all host games.
I'm now about 95% sure the NFL will have a team over here in the UK within 10 years as long as these games continue to sell 80,000+ which I imagine they will. If a small market game like the Jags/Bills can sell out 84,000 then the demand exists.
I've lost track how many games a year is the nfl playing in the uk?
They had 3 here this year. More likely 4 or 5 next year.
I still do not see a permanent team there. It will be a very hard sell to free agents.
Quote:I still do not see a permanent team there. It will be a very hard sell to free agents.
I asked Kirk Cousins about it recently and he seemed like he'd have enjoyed playing for a London team. It's only one guy but yeah...
Quote:I asked Kirk Cousins about it recently and he seemed like he'd have enjoyed playing for a London team. It's only one guy but yeah...
He'd enjoy playing for any team willing to start him.
I am sure they would not have a problem signing guy desperate to stay in the league. But if you are talking about players who actually have options, London would be at the bottom.
There is a lot of talk about adjustments team have to make when they play in London. That would be the case 8 times a year for a London team.
I see a more likely rotation possibly even a game every week in London. They might so something where each team plays an away game then the following year a home game in London. Probably when they expand the schedule.
I think one reason why the NFL will be playing even more games in London than 3 per season is because of the early morning time slot in the U.S. The NFL now has the opportunity to have 4 time slots for games on Sunday. This can only increase the value of the NFL's rights packages.
In addition, the NFL can continue to experiment with games in this time slot, such as what they did this season with the Jaguars game against the Bills. In this case, it was delivering the game exclusively on the Internet except in the two teams home markets.
A few weeks ago they were talking on NFL Sirius radio about how the Bucs were trying to get a deal with Twickenham similar to the Jaguars deal with Wembley.
Quote:A few weeks ago they were talking on NFL Sirius radio about how the Bucs were trying to get a deal with Twickenham similar to the Jaguars deal with Wembley.
It adds up when factoring in the Glazer Family owning a Premier League team and the Bucs not generating as much revenue in their home market as most NFL teams.
They all suddenly woke up and realized ...... there's more money to be made there. :woot: