Ten Reasons the NFL Wouldn't Work in England

(Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)

In America, people go to watch football several times a year to see their favorite club play. It has recently become a "national pastime" here, but the NFL has bigger plans than just here—they want to expand the NFL across the pond to Great Britain to get the English more involved in the American game.

They have already have started to do this, as they have had a regular season game there for the last two seasons and have had exhibition games in Europe for the last several seasons in the NFL's master plan to get the game to grow throughout England.

Also, the NFL created NFL Europa, which became a success in several European countries.

Here in America, people believe that this plan can work out, as they believe that with time, the NFL will become a major sport overseas.

However, there are several problems with this theory that the common fan either doesn't understand completely or doesn't want to understand about why this plan will never work out.

Here are 10 reasons why American Football won't work in England.

1. Isolated for too long

The NFL never took the initiative to spread their game overseas until the 21st century, which is an extremely long time considering that baseball, hockey, and basketball, the three other biggest sports in America, had all been spread across the pond many years ago, unlike American Football, which has waited too long to expect immediate successes in England.

2. Travel

To go to London or any other major city in England, a person would have to take a seven-hour and 25-minute flight to go from New York City to London.

With the long travel and multiple time zones that the players will have to deal with, the NFL won't be able to succeed overseas.

3. Lack of a major stadium

Whenever the NFL plays their only game in London, they always play at the new Wembley Stadium.

However, what many Americans don't realize is that the new Wembley is the most expensive stadium ever built, and the Football Association (which own the stadium) had to pay so much money to build the stadium that they will now give the stadium temporarily to multiple groups in order to regain money that they used on the stadium.

Also, the FA will have other events, such as concerts, rugby, English football championships, and English National team games all ahead of the NFL, which would force the NFL to not be able to use Wembley as their home stadium.

4. No current fanbase

Right now because of American Football's lack of time in England, there is no true major fanbase of English people in the UK, which would lead the NFL to not be able to establish its popularity as it has in the United States.

5. Rugby

Currently the most popular sport in the world that isn't in the Olympics, Rugby is a game that is not only tougher than American football, but also is rooted into the British as a game that they will always love more than American Football, which gives players 30 seconds to recuperate after just one play and has a TV timeout after nearly every five minutes. This is rather unlike rugby, which is fierce, doesn't ever stop, and has very few TV timeouts.

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