London to get NFL game

London is set to get a regular season NFL game. The NFL owners have voted to play two games outside of the US every season and London is leading the race to get the first one in 2007.

There are 32 teams currently in the NFL and the plan is for each to play a ‘home’ game outside of the US once every 16 years. This doesn’t mean a city like London will get a game every year but possibly every other year.

The NFL first played a regular season game outside the US in 2005 when the San Francisco 49ers played the Arizona Cardinals in front of 103,000 fans in the Azteca stadium in Mexico City. That’s wetted the owners appetite for expanding the profile of the league and its probably a good time.

In the UK interest in American football rocketed after the launch of Channel 4 in 1982, only the fourth British tv channel and one of their staples was Sunday night NFL. That general interest by the UK sporting public probably peaked in the early 1990’s when first the World League of American Football and then NFL Europe tried to generate a fan base for teams playing in the UK and Europe.

I think the support just fell away because fans realised they weren’t seeing the best, that was on tv every weekend, the fans had never played the game so that connection wasn’t as strong, and the teams and players were so transient.

Now the time could be ripe for a real relaunch. NFL Europe currently has six teams, five in Germany and one in Holland. The teams in London and Scotland folded, I think the Germans have stayed the course with American Football because they don’t play rugby as the like’s of England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, France, Italy, Romania, or even Spain do.

In the UK, SkySports show two live NFL games back to back on Sunday night from 6pm -12am, a primetime slot, plus highlight packages through the week. Channel Five shows the US Monday Night Football game live, starting around 1am UK time, plus some highlight programmes so the tv stations see a market.

London has some history with the NFL, it hosted the first pre-season game played outside the US when the Chicago Bears played the Dallas Cowboys at the old Wembley Stadium in 1986. For this next season’s game there are four contenders Canada, Mexico, Germany and the UK, but the head of the NFL’s UK office, Alistair Kirkwood, says it’s down to two and Britain is in the front.

There are three possible locations in the UK, the Millennnium Stadium in Cardiff, Twickenham rugby stadium in London or the new Wembley that’s due to open next summer. Wembley would be the obvious choice in terms of prestige, it’ll be the biggest stadium in Britain, the newest in Europe and has that historical link.

I think the timing is good and if the right teams come this could be a big success. The NFL schedule for 2007 comes out in March so we’ll have to see what happens.