An NFL Franchise in London? Your Views

So the NFL appear to be quite enthusiastic about having a franchise team in London in the next decade. The games in recent years hosted at Wembely have been a success, sold out stadium, tv rights in the UK, merchandise etc.
Personally being English I would love this, but logistically it seems difficult. The travelling aspect seems the biggest issue, but then also all these players would have to relocate from the US to UK, might be difficult to sell this to players.
What I will say though is British fans are unbelievable followers of sport and you definately would have packed stadium, and new fans would be gained. We know its a great sport and there's no reason fans of soccer and rugby can't like both.
What do you guys think can it happen? Opinions.

I would love to see it happen but i have my doubts. The sport is popular here and the NFL keep saying they want to expand here on the back of the Wembley games, however i just see to much red tape for it to happen any time soon.

I would love to be proved wrong though, but as a UK NFL fan i am going to say that am i not?

The traveling isn't a big deal for the American teams. You schedule the trip for the week after the visiting team's bye week. And for the east coast teams, it's really not that much longer than flying coast to coast. The problem is when the English team has to fly in and out every other week.

Would American people want it to happen?

Sure, why not?

Vehemently opposed to it. Roger Goodell's head is getting too big for his own good. He has the most profitable sport on the planet. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

It's not that I don't want to see English fans like Yogi enjoy an NFL game. But this is not a global game. It's an American game and should only have teams from North America. Let Goodell try to re-establish NFL Europe and watch it fizzle again.

i believe its better to just have one game in britian. other wise the team that is relocated in britian will be screwed over with travel, unless they do 8 straight weeks at home then away.

An unmitigated disaster. It's crap. The NFL should pursue other means of increasing its revenue. Can you imagine all of those trips back and forth across the Atlantic: 8 hours each way? The exhaustion players would experience which, in turn, would increase the prospects for injury as well as diminsh performance (including the effects upon a team's next game). How about the airbound danger (also, terrorism is much more likely in Europe)? And the playoffs? Fuggetaboutit!

I also hear talk of them hosting a superbowl in London, I can imagine there would be absolute uproar from the fans of the two teams who make that final. Being asked to pay for flights, accommodation to London!

We're forgetting something. It's dangerous to gauge commercial interest when its just one game a season played over there. Now if they had 8 games yearly, would the people be there or more likely they'll settle down (i.e. not enthusiastic sell-outs), especially if said club sucks.

There was a time when I thought Toronto was more likely than London, but the last few years the Bills have "hosted" games in Toronto and turnout has been shit.

Of course its the Bills, I can't blame Canadians.

I think for 8 games a year there would definitely be enough interest to sell out the games, for soccer a team in uk plays 38 league games in a season. Now if it was a similar schedule, for sure attendances would drop off, but for 8 games, I really believe they would sell out.

But there's an obvious difference: Football is God over there. American football doesn't even come close in popularity.

I can see your point, I just don't know if the NFL is seriously behind such a proposal or they're just bragging hypotheticals just to swing it's big hubric dick around.

Ya'll are arguing NFL economics which only the NFL really knows about. If an overseas franchise fails, that failure will be absorbed by the NFL owners, not the players or fans. My statements above are related directly to player performance, health and physical threats, and an overall decline in the game.

Your right football is huge in England and can't be touched. But you would be surprised how many people like NFL over there and NBA. A lot of people would be prepared to watch both soccer and NFL. Also you would imagine Americans living and working in London would get behind it too. I think also from memory the NFL Europe league was big in Germany so people from Europe can travel easily to London to watch.

Just another road trip to Steeler fans.

I think if something like this happens it won't be until they can set up a division or two in Europe so that travel can be reasonable.

Go Steelers! We've got the real Big Ben. Beat those Limeys butts!

I have been to a couple of the Wembley games and thoroughly enjoyed them both, will go again as well if possible. However for me to travel and stay in London for the week-end is an expensive business, so if a London team were playing 8 home games i would be able to go to just the one, maybe 2 if i'm honest!!

How was the new Wembly for watching NFL yogi? From what I hear they really put on a great show. Are you going this year? Also who is playing?

Great both times Nicky. They put on a brilliant tail gate party in the car park on the day and a huge rally party in Trafalgar Square the day before. All weekend you find folks around the place with their shirts on and on the day the pubs are heaving, especially on Baker Street!

This year it is the Patriots v the Rams. In fact the Rams have signed up to be the "home" team for the next 3 years.

No i am not going this year as the week-end it falls on i am off to Krakow in Poland for a pals big birthday booze up

It won't happen because it would need the approval of the NFL Players' Assn., which is overwhelmingly opposed to the travel. There would have to be unprecedented concessions to the union for that to happen, and Roger Goodell doesn't like giving anything to the players. He doesn't even like providing medical care to players for lingering injuries after their careers are over.

An NFL team in London (or anywhere not in north America) would be the dumbest thing they could do.

I would be all for something like say NFL Europe...

Horrible idea! Imagine the chargers or seahawks or any other west coast team having to go out there and play. Not a good idea!

I agree. As I posted above, the pysical and psychological effects can only result in a decline in performance not to mention the danger that going there or coming back a plane could go down.

A plane could crash in Kansas just as easily as it could crash in the middle of the Atlantic, but I agree that most NFC/AFC West teams would be a detriment having to play a game in London.

Well, we're talking about 3,400 miles New York to London taking over 7 hours. Miami to Seattle is about 2,700 miles and under 6 hours. Those teams to the west of New York would be in for one hell of a trip. Of course, the longer one is in a position to fall out of the sky, the greater chance that one may fall out of the sky. While traversing the US offers any number of landing fields (in addition to rescue resources) in the case of an in-flight emergency, the ocean offers none.

Plane crashes is a ridiculous argument. The travel time, especially for west coast teams, is what makes sense to me. Look at how many west coast teams lose games when traveling to the east coast to play. The travel time and time difference hits the players hard. And Klydon is completely right... there's no getting past the players association. It won't happen.

As much as I would love to see games played in England, I think it's an absurd idea unless someone creates a millenium falcon to get the players to Europe at light speed.