The new Santiago Bernabeu will be finished, if all goes according to plan, for the season 2022-2023. Although matches may be hosted there in the coming months, the pharaonic work of the Castellana and its surroundings will come to an end in about a year. Madrid's idea is to turn the stadium into a venue where, in addition to football, all kinds of sporting and cultural events can be held throughout the year without depending on the weather thanks to its retractable roof.
One of the great events that the board has set itself the goal of organizing is an NFL game, the American football league in the United States and the sports competition that generates the most money in the world (13,000 million dollars per season according to ESPN), as advanced The confidential. The competition leaders have their eyes on Europe in general and in Spain in particular, where his sport has grown exponentially in recent years. Madrid wants to take advantage of this and has offered the new Bernabéu, which is right now the preferred NFL scene to carry out an international match, although it is not the only option that is contemplated in Spain, according to sources close to the white club have informed this newspaper. It would be something similar to what the competition does in London in the stadium of Tottenham, where he organizes a meeting every year.
The idea would be, first, that the works are 100% finished and then check that the facilities are prepared to host an event of these characteristics, something that should not be a problem considering the interest of the white club to carry it out. As AS has learned, Madrid's idea is that a match be held between 2023 and 2025. 2023 would be, perhaps too soon, so everything indicates that 2024 or 2025 would be the most propitious years. From the NFL they assure to this newspaper not be in negotiations with Madrid or with any other organization in Spain to carry out a match, although they do not deny intend to do so in the near future.
Germany, closer than Spain
Before it takes place in Spain, the NFL wants to bring a game to Germany. As announced by the American media Sports Business Journal, the idea is that between 2022 and 2023 one is organized in the Allianz Arena Munich, the house of Bayern. The two million Germans who saw the last Super bowl According to audience data, they have motivated managers to speed up the meeting, something similar to what is happening in Spain, although in the Iberian country football growth is still a bit slower.
These international meetings are understood within the expansionist policy that the NFL is doing. The league has been wanting to expand its brand outside of the United States for years and now sees in Europe a big market in which American football begins to make a niche among the most traditional sports of the Old continent like soccer, basketball or rugby.