Over in the US, the National Football League is one of the most exciting and enthralling sports leagues there is. It’s a highly charged and emotional community, with fans across America cheering on their team every single week. It’s lucrative, too, with a whole industry springing up behind it including online casinos and sportsbooks that have a multitude of different betting options for each game, even in the smaller leagues.
But the situation is somewhat different in Europe and in the UK. The NFL, as it’s known for short, hasn’t really taken off there in the same way. This blog post will look at some of the more – and less – obvious reasons why this might be the case.
What has happened so far?
In short: not much. Figures show that just over 2 million Germans, for example, indicated an interest in the sport – given that the population of Germany is over 80 million, that’s not a big number. NFL has attempted to rectify this lack of European presence in a number of ways: it has, for example, started hosting games at the iconic Wembley Stadium in London – and while Britain is no longer a member of the European Union, it’s still considered to be part of Europe, in the transatlantic sense.
There has been some talk in recent years of formalizing this sort of arrangement. Roger Goodell, who serves as the Commissioner of the NFL, has been open about his desire to create a situation in which London has its very own American football team. Clearly, then, there’s already some market demand for this – otherwise the organization’s senior figure would surely not be interested in making the move here. But the fact that this has not yet happened indicates that demand might be more complex than it seems.
Lack of a sports betting gaming community
Perhaps the most obvious reason why the NFL hasn’t taken off in Europe to the same degree as in the US is that the big casinos and sports betting companies focus on the US market because NFL caters to the all-american viewer. Also this market is huge, for example in New Jersey where the sports betting community started, with bettors in the state racking up more than $1 billion dollars in sports betting handle in september 2021.
Moreover, for Americans it makes far more sense that fans will congregate around the team that is based in their home community, city or state – and if that’s not on offer, it’s entirely possible that they’ll focus on what’s happening sports-wise in their nearest big city or majorly populated state.
The NFL in particular is known for its commitment to localism. The Green Bay Packers, based in Wisconsin, are owned by the community. They’re known for being a so-called ‘small town’ team simply because they’re not based in a large city – a phenomenon that essentially makes them a throwback to the days of the early 20th century. While this certainly isn’t the case across the country or across the entire game, it’s certainly true that local connection has an almost mythologized place in the NFL.
Presence of association football
The next reason why it continues to be unlikely that the NFL will find a permanent stronghold in Europe is that association football is far more dominant in the European region. Despite some misconceptions, it’s certainly the case that association football is very different to NFL. Some of the key differences include the size and shape of the ball, as well as the fact that the ball can be touched by hand in NFL – whereas in association football it cannot.
In many ways, the Europeans already have their fill of football, thanks to association football – and there’s perhaps no more room for a new sort of football to come in and grow. The size of teams like FC Barcelona, which is worth $4.06bn and which plays in big-name matches throughout the year, indicates that many Europeans already have what they need to be entertained by football.
There’s an argument that an American import might be able to ‘cut through’ to a European market in a different way to associate football, perhaps because it might seem fresh or interesting. Similar things have happened with sectors like music or Hollywood films, but this doesn’t seem likely to happen any time soon.
Overall, it’s the case that the NFL has been distinctly unable to get going in the European market in recent years. The dominance of association football, as well as the NFL’s partial capacity for (and commitment to) localism, has meant that the American version is far from off the ground there. Only time will tell whether this trend has the capacity to reverse any time soon – even if some senior figures in the organization, such as Roger Goodell, want it to.
