The National Football League, or the NFL is more commonly known, head to London in October for where two explosive games take place at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
On 10 October the Atlanta Falcons take on the New York Jets and a week later, on 17 October, Jacksonville Jaguars face the Miami Dolphins.
NFL teams have played regular-season games in London for the past 13 seasons, as the NFL management team wants to expand grid iron’s global reach.
Daniel Levy, current chairman of Tottenham Hotspur, spent £1 billion constructing the new stadium, which has unique changing rooms for the massive NFL rosters, plus the world’s first dividing, retractable football pitch, which reveals a synthetic field underneath for NFL London games.
The first 2021 NFL London game sees the Atlanta Falcons play host to the famous New York Jets.
While neither franchise is destined for Super Bowl glory according to the best NFL betting sites odds, the game will be an exciting spectacle for anyone lucky enough to attend.
Jets hoping to clip the Falcons’ wings
Atlanta Falcons endured a brutal 2020 campaign.
They finished with a 4-12 record that left them rooted to the bottom of the NFC South division and the bottom of the NFC Conference, missing out on the playoffs for the third consecutive year.
The New York Jets did not fare any better, finishing 2-14 for the season.
The Jets lost 14 consecutive games before winning back-to-back fixtures against the Los Angeles Rams (23-20) and Cleveland Browns (23-16) before slumping to a heavy 14-28 defeat on the road at New England Patriots.
Finishing with such a poor record was a blessing in disguise for Jets fans because of how the NFL draft works.
The teams with the worst records get the first picks when it comes to drafting up-and-coming talent.
Jets secured quarterback Zach Wilson as the second overall pick, and Wilson is a hot prospect, who NFL fans should see in action against the Falcons.
Florida rivals clash in London
On 17 October, the Jacksonville Jaguars take on the world-famous Miami Dolphins.
Both teams are going through something of a transition period, but the fact they are local rivals (both are located in the state of Florida) means this clash will be explosive.
The Jaguars stormed to the AFC South title in 2017 but have failed to reach those dizzy heights again in the previous three seasons, and 2020 saw the Jaguars slump to a 1-15 record, the worst in the entire NFL.
They defeated the Indianapolis Colts 27-20 on the first game of the regular season but failed to register another victory in their next 15 games.
Anyone attending the game will see Trevor Lawrence in action for the Jaguars.
Quarterback Lawrence was the first overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft and is seen as one of the hottest prospects in recent years.
The former Clemson player is destined for superstardom and could even become as good as the Kansas City Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes.
Experts believe the Dolphins could be the NFL’s surprise package for the 2021 season.
The franchise has a long and illustrious history, but the team has failed to live up to lofty expectations since the turn of the century.
However, Dolphins looked to have turned a corner and finished 2021 second in the AFC East with a 10-6 record, their first winning season since 2016.
The Dolphins were inconsistent last season, which is expected because they have a relatively young roster.
In Tua Tagovailoa, the Dolphins have a talented playmaker pulling strings from the pocket.
His debut rookie season saw him throw for 1,814 yards and 11 touchdowns, although his offensive linemen failed to protect him, and he was sacked 15 times.
Tagovailoa will have learned from his first season and is definitely one to watch this coming season, especially as the Dolphins drafted wide receiver Jaylen Waddle as the sixth overall pick.
Waddle has cheat-mode pace and will be a go-to receiver for Tagovailoa throughout the campaign.
Featured image credit: Hzh via Wikimedia Commons under CC BY-SA 4.0 license
