 NFL
can teach football
about global expansion
LONDON - It will be like a home
from home, with jazz bands playing and the smell
of Cajun cooking wafting between the queues of
fans as they wait for the big game to start. Except
home for the New Orleans Saints is actually over
4,500 miles away from the green turf of Wembley,
where they play the San Diego Chargers on Sunday
evening.
Thousands of Saints fans will be
forced either to miss one of only eight regular-season
home games they get each year, stump up hundreds
of dollars to travel to London, or watch at home
on television. Welcome to the NFL's “international
game”, a cross-border money-spinner that
English football's Premier League yearns for yet
may never be able to stage.
When Richard Scudamore, the Premier
League chief executive, disclosed his ambition
to stage top-flight fixtures in ten locations
around the globe, the football world exploded
with derision at what was rapidly vilified as
“the 39th game”. Resistance from fans
was huge, the Government was chary and Sepp Blatter,
president of Fifa, football's world governing
body, was outraged ....
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