Goodell says Melbourne trip informs NFL’s next overseas games
The commissioner praised the league’s Australia game and said teams’ different travel approaches offered lessons as the NFL weighs future international dates
The NFL is studying what its first game in Australia taught it about staging games farther from home. Roger Goodell praised the Melbourne event at a league meeting Thursday, while saying the two participating teams' different travel plans gave the league something to examine before future overseas trips.
The San Francisco 49ers and Los Angeles Rams reached Australia on different schedules: San Francisco arrived a week ahead of the game, while Los Angeles arrived only a day before it. Goodell did not prescribe a standard itinerary in his remarks, but he said the league learned from those choices. Asked about the possibility of games in Asia, he indicated that teams could handle such travel.
Attendance at the Melbourne Cricket Ground was officially 100,021. The game began Friday morning in Australia to reach a Thursday-night U.S. audience, a demanding time slot that Goodell nevertheless cited as evidence of local interest. He called the event “a tremendous success on really every level.”
Those remarks do not announce another Australian game or a new Asian venue. They do, however, identify two considerations for any such expansion: whether fans will turn out at unconventional local hours, and how much time clubs need to adapt to the long journey. Goodell's assessment gives the league a favorable review of Melbourne while leaving its next international scheduling decisions open.