Does the NFL think there are not cities other than london to host regular season games outside

[RB TexLa]

of the US?


Barcelona? Berlin? Rome? Moscow? Tokyo? Amsterdam? And of course Mexico City.

[mrs_p]

1. isn't the air quality in mexico city

unbearable? i've never been, but my friends who spend a lot of time in mexico tell me such.

[JonLP24]

4. I know the altitude is high

But Arizona and San Francisco played at Azteca in Mexico City before and it set the record for largest crowd to see a regular season NFL game which I guess was broken by Dallas at home against the Giants this year.

[caraher]

13. I thought it was altitude + smog

I've never been there, but Mexico City at least used to have a terrible smog problem

[naaman fletcher]

2. yeah but..

They are trying to expand it outside of the US, and like with any other product they are targetting a specific market. For some reason or other they think that England is the most suitable place to try to expand to, and are focusing their efforts there. It would make little sense to spread the marketing efforts around. They have picked one good target and are going with it.

Of course, I don't understand why they don't go after the Canadian market. I know the CFL exists, but I think that is all the more reason they could easily do 1 or 2 NFL expansion teams there.

[JonLP24]

3. Arizona played San Francisco in Mexico City already

It was a regular season game too.

[SidDithers]

5. And once again, Toronto is overlooked...

we had one Bills game last year, and have got 4 more over the next 4 years.

We are outside of the US, you know.

Sid

[Captain Hilts]

7. But folks know about the controversy related to those games. How the NFL's agreement with the CFL

has been squashed flat as a bug.

That's already gotten a lot of play.

Capt. Hilts, who wishes she was jogging the Bloor, Yonge, Queen, Spadina, Bloor loop right now.

[Captain Hilts]

6. Because there is a lot of money and English speakers and USians in London. And the flight

isn't as bad as getting to Rome.

[T_i_B]

8. The trouble is...

...We've already got Rugby League and Rugby Union in Britain, both of which are much better sports.

If I'd been in London this weekend I'd have recommended watching Australia v New Zealand playing Rugby League at The Stoop. I'm also starting to follow Rotherham in Rugby Union right now.

[Captain Hilts]

9. I can't argue with that, but that's the answer to a different question. This is supply not demand

driven.

[T_i_B]

10. My point is...

...there is already a very good supply of quality sport involving oval balls in London without the NFL. Maybe it would be better if they tried somewhere like Germany or the Netherlands where rugby hasn't taken off?

[Captain Hilts]

11. Again, it's supply driven, not demand driven. Germany is too far to fly a team

and teams complained about the games in Japan because of the uber long flight.

I, personally, think rugby etc. are very entertaining. I'm trying to get the 'football' package with my cable deal.

But this is the NFL and a few years ago they ditched their traditional agreement not to have games in Canada.

It's like kudzo.

[Capt. America]

12. Rio, Puerto Rico, Montreal, Vancouver, Bogota, Johannesburg?

[muriel_volestrangler]

14. Capacity, and the price they can get away with charging

Wembley is a big stadium - nominal capacity of 90,000, with the most under-cover seats in the world. In 2005 in Mexico City, they sold tickets for $23-$80; London 2009, £30-£140 (about $50-$230).

Barcelona is the largest European stadium; it's the only one they might get more money out of, I'd say, but I don't know what the fan base in Spain is like (especially in the east at Barcelona - London is handily central for a large, densely packed part of the English population, in the South East, so that people could make it back home that night. I was on a train last night that stopped at the stadium specially to pick up fans leaving, and even on my connecting train in another direction out of London, I'd think over a third the passengers had been at the game).

[bigwillq]

15. Baghdad

:shrug:

[TK421]

16. I'm sure the "rubble" seats can't go for that much money?

:D