NFL in London

[PeteC]

It's getting bigger and bigger. Sunday's game had 83,559 in attendance . Three games in London next season. Don't know if more this year or not. Pete

Kaepernick leads 49ers over Jags 42-10 in London

http://news.yahoo.com/kaepernick-leads- ... --spt.html

[johnnyk]

They 're lovin' it even though they are getting crappy matchups like SF-Jax. They need to see two top teams going at it.

[caller]

It was probably bigger about 25 years ago!

[Khundon1975]

The wife watched the match at the weekend with friends, all whoops and hollers , I don't understand the game and listened to classical music in the study.

[caller]

I remember the 1st wave, I think there was even a London team? I recall a shop in Earls Court that sold all the relevant sports gear, helmets the lot and I'm sure there were others and amateur clubs and leagues were formed. It used to be covered on C4 I believe and there was much hype about how it was going to be the next big thing, but as soon as it seemed to get a foothold, it just faded away.

To a lesser degree it was the same with aussies rules footie, which used to bring their circus to London for an annual match at The Oval (I spent an interesting time in the day job there once), that fell away as well.

[lomuamart]

I never had much time for the game until Channel 4 started showing it on Sunday evenings between 6-8pm, if I remember rightly. After a few weeks, I was hooked and always had to be back home to watch it.
What I liked about the C4 coverage was that they explained the game, the positions etc bit by bit, week by week and that gave me a better appreciation of it all. There were then highlights and one featured game.
As Caller says, it just petered out - as far as TV was concerned. That was surprising as I'm sure I recall it was the best viewed C4 program at the time.

[MrPlum]

Dickie Davies used to do the Superbowl highlights and I was hooked. It was great to see C4 show full games, less adverts. In the U.S., games were constantly interrupted, even for moments of high drama, by adverts for sanitary towels and hemorrhoids.

[johnnyk]

Caller, London had a team in a Euro league that played American football but never in the NFL.
Yes, lots of commercials, that's because it's by far the number one sport on TV in America as baseball has faded.
Not everyone likes NFL football but it is without doubt the best sports product on TV. Best coverage, best technology to show everything from a zillion angles. I watch soccer and can't believe how lame the camera work and direction is.

[PeteC]

Three games scheduled for Wembley next season. If team performance remains the same as this year, the first game Oakland/Miami should be the best. Pete

http://news.yahoo.com/dates-set-three-2 ... --nfl.html

[johnnyk]

Oakland-Miami is pretty lame. They need to show Seattle-San Francisco or Baltimore-Pittsburgh, two great smashmouth rivalries.

[PeteC]

Talking of Baltimore/Pittsburgh, they're on ASN in about 90 minutes. The Oakland/Dallas game is turning out to be a good one, and Detroit killed Green Bay. Some good Thanksgiving games this year....except Detroit/GB.