The NFL will soon decide whether it will put a 2024 regular-season game in Spain or Brazil, league executive vice president Peter O’Reilly said Tuesday, according to multiple media reports.
Last month, the NFL told its teams that Madrid, Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo were all possibilities to host future games. Sports Business Journal and Front Office Sports reported that the verdict as to the 2024 site will be made in December or January. If either Spain or Brazil winds up getting a contest, Germany’s allotment of games next year would be reduced from two to one.
O’Reilly said, according to Front Office Sports, “There’s real opportunity. Germany is a unique market with the history of NFL Europe and how strong the American football legacy is there, but the reason we’re looking at Brazil and Spain is based on the size of the fanbases there.”
The NFL is playing five international games this year. The first was contested at Wembley Stadium in London (a 23-7 Jacksonville Jaguars win over the Atlanta Falcons on Oct. 1), and the next two were held at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London (the Jaguars beat the Buffalo Bills 25-20 on Oct. 8, and the Baltimore Ravens defeated the Tennessee Titans 24-16 on Sunday).
The last two are slated for next month in Frankfurt, Germany: Miami Dolphins versus Kansas City Chiefs on Nov. 5 and Indianapolis Colts versus New England Patriots on Nov. 12.
The 2022 slate also included five international games: three in London, one in Munich, Germany, and one in Mexico City. However, Mexico isn’t in the mix this year or next year with Estadio Azteca undergoing renovations ahead of the 2026 World Cup.
The last time the NFL staged a regular-season game in a country other than the United States, England, Germany or Mexico was 2013, when the Buffalo Bills faced the Falcons in Canada. The Bills played a home game in Toronto every year from 2008-13.
NFL exhibition games have been staged in Japan (14 times between 1976 and 2005), Sweden (1988), Spain (1993-94), Ireland (1997) and Australia (1999).
–Field Level Media