NFL Outside America

In this post I will look at where American Football is played outside of the USA. The sport is played in a number of countries, but I will focus on Ireland and Canada for this blog.

The Irish American Football League (IAFL) is the amateur league that Irish teams play in. The league runs from February to July, in the hope of good weather. The champions are decided in the Shamrock Bowl, which the two best teams are entered into. The Dublin Rebels are the current champions. Both UCD and Trinity have a team entered in the league.

In Canada they play a slightly altered game, called Canadian Football, with teams competing in the Canadian Football League (CFL). In this post I will look at the main differences to the American game.

• The playing field is slightly longer.
• CFL teams have 12 men on each side of the ball, NFL only allows 11.
• The ball is slightly different.
• CFL only allows 3 downs to get the 10 yards required for a first down, the NFL allows 4.

In my opinion both games would be equally enjoyable to watch, but the NFL is superior because there is a larger amount of players and this results in more elite players.
Shamrock Bowl XXIII (2009) - Q1 from IAFA on Vimeo.
Thanks for reading