“Look at how many people we made happy tonight, and I’m happy because I’m going home tomorrow”.
Those were the words of Charlie Davis when asked how he felt after playing in the first NFL game to be held outside of North America in 1976.
That pre-season contest between the St Louis Cardinals and the San Diego Chargers took place in Tokyo but since then, there have been 40 regular-season international games.
Thirty of those have taken place in London, a city that has become the NFL’s home away from home since 2007 and hosts three games every year. The NBA has also held 33 regular-season games around the world dating back to 1990.
Could a similar idea ever work with a Premier League match?
The stakeholders for English football’s top flight discussed a “roadmap for meaningful matches abroad” in June 2021 but this was centred on pre-season fixtures in key foreign markets such as the US, China, India, Brazil and Indonesia rather than the so-called “39th game” floated by former Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore in 2008.
The lure of playing in front of fans based outside the UK is clear from the countries in which Premier League teams are playing pre-season fixtures as they tour the world for the first time since the summer of 2019. Australia, the US, Singapore, Thailand and South Korea are some of the more far-flung destinations for top-flight clubs, as well as playing a host of warm-up matches against teams in Europe.
And you can see why the prospect of a Premier League match abroad would be appealing from a commercial perspective. When the NFL held its first competitive match in London between the New York Giants and the Miami Dolphins at Wembley in 2007, there were more than one million ticket requests. The fixture sold out within 90 minutes.
Jaguars fans at Wembley in 2018 (Photo: Steve Flynn/USA TODAY)
Tottenham struck a 10-year deal to host NFL games at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in 2015. The bulk of income the NFL makes from hosting games abroad is from broadcasting rights but for the host stadium, there are healthy incentives. Tottenham are paid a hosting fee by the NFL and keep the proceeds from food and drink sales and merchandising profit from the club’s shop.
In Tottenham’s first NFL game in 2019, a 24-21 win for Oakland (now Las Vegas) Raiders over Chicago Bears, they set a new European record for the sales of beer at a sporting venue on what was called a “multi-million-pound payday“.
The Jacksonville Jaguars will face the Denver Broncos on October 30 at Wembley.
The Jaguars, who have the same owner as Fulham in Shahid Khan, have a deal in place with Wembley to play there once a year for the next three years, having played in England’s capital eight times since 2013, the most of any NFL side. When the Jaguars play at Wembley, it generates twice the amount of revenue as a home game held at TIAA Bank Field in Jacksonville, Miami.
“Wembley’s a cool place, I would’ve loved to play over here,” says Tony Boselli, one of the Jaguars’ most iconic players and the first they drafted when the franchise launched in 1995.
The longest distance two Premier League teams will travel during the 2022-23 season is a little over 350 miles, when Newcastle face Bournemouth. But it’s more than 4,000 miles between Jacksonville and London, as well as four or five hours’ time difference, depending on daylight savings.
If the Premier League was to ever hold a fixture in another continent, it would likely be broadcast at a time that is unfamiliar to British spectators, but Boselli thinks the difference is not necessarily a bad thing.
Boselli on the Jaguars’ player tour in London this month (Photo: Shooting Shark)
“When I talk to my friends who are big (American) football fans, they love it, because the first game is at 9.30am, and then they go from a game at 9.30am to a game at 1pm to a game at 4pm and then there’s a night game,” he says. “At the start, it was a little bit of a novelty, but now, I think people are like, ‘Great, teams are going to play in London, so we get more NFL to watch’.
“I love football and I love that NFL is going international in trying to grow the game and educate the fans about it. If you look at soccer, soccer is the world’s game. Everyone plays soccer everywhere, they don’t play American football everywhere.”
But how do players feel about all that extra travel? “Around the halfway point of the season, that’s when the body starts getting a little bit more banged up. So it’ll be a different dynamic with the long travel, but if you leave there with a win, it makes it worth it,” explains Evan Engram, the Jaguars’ newly acquired tight end. “I’ve always wanted to (play at Wembley). It feels special to be able to showcase our talents in London.”
Longer travel time has often been cited as a reason teams sometimes struggle. However, in the eyes of Boselli, jet lag cannot be used as an excuse.
“You’re flying a chartered plane and you’re staying at nice hotels,” says the 50-year-old, who retired in 2003. “Get your sleep, get your rest and go play football. Good teams win, no matter where you play. Good players perform, no matter where you play.”
Travelling to different continents is not just a strain on the players, though.
When the Los Angeles Rams faced the Cincinnati Bengals in 2019 at Wembley, the Rams shipped over 25,000lb (more than 11,000kg) of cargo. The New York Jets played against the Miami Dolphins in London in October 2015 but sent over their supplies in August to ensure it all arrived on time.
Among that shipment were 263 boxes of food, 315 power devices, 472 pieces of athletic equipment, 1,268 promotional items and 350 rolls of American toilet paper.
The last item on that list may seem extreme (US toilet roll is softer, apparently) but to be successful, NFL franchises must do everything they can to replicate the exact conditions the players are used to when playing in America.
That includes the food the players eat. “The bacon over here is not cooked quite as crisp as it is in America,” adds Boselli. “I don’t think they know how to make crispy bacon in London!”
For Engram, his go-to pre-game meal is steak and eggs. But not just any steak will suffice: filet mignon is his cut of choice. He thinks most of the rituals players carry out at home can be transferred across the pond, though.
“Before each game, home or away, I try to be the first one on the field,” explains Engram. “I sit at the goalposts and pray, relax and meditate to try and get my mind ready before going into battle.”
Engram speaks to media in London (Photo: Shooting Shark)
Boselli had a similar ritual. “Everyone has their own little quirks. I would get up early and eat breakfast on my own, and I’d try to get to the stadium as early as possible.
“As a professional athlete, you make a lot of money. Use the off-season to go and enjoy London. When you come here to play, it’s a business trip, there’s no time for sightseeing or nightclubs.”
Being exposed to different weather conditions is also part of being a professional athlete. Engram traded in the cold climes of New York for sunnier shores in Jacksonville. “When I’m playing in the cold, I don’t put on sleeves because it could alter something or change how I catch the ball,” he says. “You got to fight through it no matter what.”
At NFL matches held in London, it’s common to see fans wearing a variety of different teams’ jerseys in the stands. The atmosphere is more party-like than fierce. “There will be a lot of cheering for both teams,” says Boselli, “but we understand that. It’s part of the fun of it all.”
This would likely be replicated if the Premier League held a fixture abroad: you would have a small group who are hardcore supporters and a larger majority attracted by the prospect of entertainment.
So how do you replicate the level of intensity you need to thrive considering what’s at stake? If a team takes its foot off the gas during an international match with points on offer, it could prove costly.
“Any stadium that has more than 10,000 people in, it’s still going to be loud. You’re still going to feel something,” says Engram.
(Top photo: Kirby Lee/USA TODAY)