Roger Goodell confirmed that the NFL is expanding its international schedule of games in future seasons. With games already taking place in England, Germany, Mexico, and Brazil, other countries are going to be put on the map in the NFL’s quest for world domination.
And one of their next stops could be down under in Australia.
According to Jonathan Jones at CBS, NFL regular season games could take place in Australia by the 2026 season with the NFL building relationships and making inroads in the continent which has its own unique brand of football as their national sport.
Via CBS Sports:
Outside of London, where the NFL has for years centered its international operations, the country seeing the greatest investment from the NFL is Australia. Sources tell CBS Sports the NFL could hold a regular season game on the island continent as early as the 2026 season, and the NFL has pondered playing the Pro Bowl Games Down Under at some point in the future.
Though the NFL is expanding its international games to eight for the 2025 season, it is believed that Australia — specifically Sydney and Melbourne — will have to wait another year for a game. The NFL has conducted site visits to both cities as it continues to work through the logistical hurdles.
Despite a time difference larger than any other lands currently being explored by the league — Sydney is 16 hours ahead of Eastern time now but 14 hours ahead in September — the NFL is eager to get to Australia for a regular season game. Consider the investments the league has made there: In 2022, the NFL tabbed New Zealand native Charlotte Offord to be the general manager for its Australian efforts. In September of this year, the league opened an NFL Academy on Australia’s Gold Coast that will develop student athletes between the ages of 12 to 18.
Goodell has gone on the record that Ireland could host a game as early as next year, but this would be the first regular season trip for the NFL to the other side of the world.
And while Australia might be a great market for NFL worldwide expansion, the immediate question goes to the impact on American fans, specifically thanks to the enormous time difference.
To this point, the NFL’s international series has been fairly friendly to its core fanbase. The NFL has put most all of its European games on in the early morning hours at 9:30 a.m. ET in a new, exclusive timeslot. Mexico and Brazil games can take place at any time since they’re on roughly the same timezone as we are in the western hemisphere.
But… Australia?
The 14-16 hour time difference would be a very awkward setup for fans in one place or the other. The only time window that would make sense for the NFL stateside is a late primetime game (think late MNF doubleheader window) that would kick off around noon in Australia. But if the game were to be on Sunday, that would place the local kickoff at noon on a Monday… not exactly a great situation for the new fans in an international market that you are trying to reach.
That leaves a potential Friday or Saturday night game stateside as the only real option for a potential NFL game in Australia that won’t be a complete non-starter for one side or the other. But in the quest to triple league revenue, the logistical challenges for fans, players, and teams is only a minor inconvenience.