The NFL plays games in London, and they are talking about giving London its own franchise, but does London want a team? So all you people that live in the UK, do you really want an NFL team? Are you prepared to stay up late at night to watch the games when they play away games in the U.S.? Are you prepared to get up early in the morning for home games so that people in the U.S. don't have to stay up late?
They play games in Dublin too but there's no appetite for it. They more or less give away tickets just to get a crowd but it's too girlie - this is what we play no girlie shoulder pads - just raw UFC with a ball!
Yes, Notre Dame and I believe it was Navy, played a college game in Dublin last year, or a couple years before. This will be an actual NFL team that will play team like the New England Patriots, Miami Dolphins, and New York Giants.
NFL is pretty popular right now. Available on a number of TV channels. (Still very much a minority passion though.) It was popular for a spell in the mid 80s but then fell from favour. Its popularity today, I sense, is more entrenched and might well endure. I don't doubt a London team would be financially viable. Wembley (or similar) would be full for every game. Your Sunday lunchtime games are - of course - screened here at eminently watchable (and playable!) early evening times.
Rugby is awesome, but I've never much enjoyed watching handegg games. It's like baseball, just never quite grabbed my interest. For the sake of experiencing it, though, I wouldn't turn down, say, Super Bowl tickets. I always kind of thought Brits weren't that into American football 'cause they've got their own leagues, football culture, hooligans and firms, etc.
National Football League. The professional league for American Football in the USA. The Superbowl is played by NFL teams. I think a lot of foreigners will become more interested in American football as the changes making way in the game are carried through and the players and coaches fully adapt to them. There's a lot of penalty calls per game nowadays but in time it will smooth out and people will get a better feel and appreciation for the more choreographed and cerebral style of gameplay being implemented. A common complaint against AFB from say, Rugby fans, is that Rugby is more brutal, but as the ongoing changes in the game are hammered out, detractors will start to see the virtues in the kind of game they are engineering.
Don't think there is the appetite, they always try to bring it over here, and there's always one friend on the edge of every crowd who plays it, but it's hard enough to sustain rugby league...in London. I think you need to live it to love it. I was watching the Superbowl and a fat guy fell over the man with the ball. It was a 'great play,' and 'skill' from the 'top drawer,' but I couldn't see it myself. Enjoyed my half hour tho' with that ugly guy who looks like Lance Armstrong at Q Back, everybody chewing gum. It's likeable, American. You wouldn't want to watch a whole night of me juggling youtube with the wife on vodka heels, but half an hour would be okay.
See some of you guys don't watch enough of the NFL to really appreciate some of the plays that go on. Here is a play a guy did while playing for my favorite team the Cincinnati Bengals a few years ago.
Nice, no, I'm being disingenuous. My son is a 'college football' nut. What I don't 'get' is that there is no football scene that is not directed toward the elite, the best in professional sport. You don't have veteran or amateur 'football,' simply for the love of chucking a ball around and hitting people. Would you explain please - we have 'soccer,' and amateur rugby leagues for every fat guy, y'know... I always found that intriguing.
Oh we do have amateur leagues but because there is a lot of normal cost for equipment, they are mostly 'flag football' leagues. Instead of tackling a guy you just have to grab one of his flags to stop the play. There are also other 'semi-pro' leagues that are basically a bunch of regular guys playing.
Yeah, that's very interesting - but alot like 'touch rugby.' Like don't tell my friends - but I'm interested in how rugby, Aussi rules/gaelic fb and American football all diverged 120 years ago. They used to be similar and played against, among each other once upon a time. I vouch rather than NFL coming to UK, rugby is gaining ground your ways. I think there's 400 000 rugby players in the US, and the Eagles almost beat the Maoris a couple of months ago... but then, I like being a fan of sport, but I always prefer playing sport, at whatever level.
Rugby here in the U.S. is more of a 'Club' sport. Guys get together and create a team and then they have unofficial games they schedule and so forth. A lot of colleges have rugby interim leagues for regular students. Recently there has been some rugby players that have joined the NFL. In fact one of rugby's fastest and best players signed with the Detroit Lions. http://sports.yahoo.com/news/lions-sign-speedy-rugby-player-205315715--nfl.html;_ylt=A0LEV0P_cPFSPmcA5ztXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEzMXRva2Y5BHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDNQRjb2xvA2JmMQR2dGlkA1ZJUDM2MV8x
Thanks Lewdog, I was getting quite boring there ...I was at International school in the 70s - everybody was a Dallas Cowboys fan, so...so was I.
