The NFL owners will be meeting in Houston on October 10-11, and one of the topics on the agenda is the possibility of adding a second game in London, according to a report from the Sports Business Journal. The NFL declined to comment.
The first regular season game in London was in 2007, and the current resolution allowing the league to play games in London expires after next month’s annual contest.
This season’s regular season game is scheduled for London’s Wembley Stadium for October 23, between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Chicago Bears. The Bucs will be giving up a home game for the London match, for the second time in three years. The Bucs owner, Malcolm Glazer, also owns the top European football (aka soccer) club in England – Manchester United.
The coaches and players are generally not fond of the London games, as the extra travel is a huge disruption to their schedule.
The NFL games in London have all sold out quickly, but the long term plan for London isn’t clear – if expanding to two games is one step towards putting an expansion team in London, which has been informally discussed.
An expansion club in London would represent tremendous logistical problems, including providing the greatest home field advantage in all of sports. Instead of dealing with a 2-3 hour time difference on cross country flights, US-based teams would have a 5-8 hour time difference to deal with. The London team would have to deal with the time difference on all their away games.
