NFL Europe and Talk:Pavlo Tarnovetskyy: Difference between pages

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[[Image:NFLEurope.png|frame|NFL Europe logo]]

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[[Image:WorldLeagueofAmericanFootball.png|frame|Old World League of American Football ([[World League of American Football|WLAF]]) logo]]

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The '''NFL Europe League''' is an [[American football]] league which operates in [[Europe]]. It was founded in 1991 as the '''[[World League of American Football]] (WLAF)'''.

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There are currently six teams in the league: five based in [[Germany]] and one in the [[Netherlands]]. Players in NFL Europe are predominantly assigned by [[National Football League|NFL]] teams who want these younger, "developmental" players to get additional game experience and coaching. The expenses of these players and their coaches while living in Europe are assumed by the league.

==History==

NFL Europe was originally founded in 1991 as the [[World League of American Football]]. The original WLAF was an [[American football]] league partially backed by the [[National Football League]] and, like the current NFL Europe, was a spring developmental league. Originally, the ancestor to NFL Europe had 10 teams playing a 10-game regular season: six teams from the [[United States]], three European teams, and one Canadian team. The two teams emerging from the [[WLAF]] semi-final playoffs met at the end of the season in the [[World Bowl]]. The first two [[World Bowl]] games were held at predetermined locations much like the modern [[Super Bowl]]. The original WLAF was unpopular in the United States, and only marginally more popular in Europe. Total attendances at the fifty games in each season were between 1.2 and 1.3 million, giving an average attendance in the mid twenty thousands. The WLAF suspended operations in 1993 prior to the season.

However, the [[National Football League]] still liked the idea of a spring developmental league, and after revamping itself into an exclusively European circuit, the league re-launched in 1995, consisting of the three existing European teams from the original format as well as three new teams in [[Amsterdam]], [[Düsseldorf]] and [[Edinburgh]] (who would compete as [[Scotland]]). All six teams play in a single division and the 10-game format has been preserved. The original playoff format matched the first-half champion against the team with the best overall season record (or the runner-up, in the event the first-half champion also had the best overall record.) The first-half champion would host the championship game. This format was abandoned after the 1997 season. In subsequent years, the two teams with the best overall record after 10 games compete in the World Bowl, to be hosted at a pre-determined site. The change is largely attributed to the play of the eventual 1997 World Bowl champions, the Barcelona Dragons, who secured a World Bowl berth with a 4-1 first-half record and proceeded to rest players and play what some argued was low-intensity football in the second half, finishing with just a 5-5 record and third place overall in the league's standings.

By the end of the 1997 season, the league were growing concerned that their markets outside of Germany were not living up to their potential. Radical changes were made to the two British teams, spelling the beginning of the end for one. The London Monarchs would become the England Monarchs, switch their colours from blue, gold and red to red, white and black, and play their home games in London, [[Birmingham, England|Birmingham]] and [[Bristol, England|Bristol]]. Also, the Scottish Claymores would divide their schedule between Edinburgh and [[Glasgow]]. Then, at a press conference in [[San Diego]] during [[Super Bowl XXXII]] weekend, the league announced it too would be changing: the league would be rebranded as the NFL Europe League.

The NFL Europe era has been beset by instability. The England Monarchs were shut down after the 1998 season, being replaced by the [[Berlin Thunder]]. In 2002, the [[Barcelona Dragons]] became an official section of [[FC Barcelona]], adopting the name FC Barcelona Dragons, but folded after the 2003 season when Barça dropped its sponsorship. A new German franchise, the [[Cologne Centurions]], took the Dragons' place in the league in 2004. The [[Scottish Claymores]], one of the 3 teams added to the league in 1995, were also discontinued with their replacements ([[Hamburg Sea Devils]]) being established for the 2005 season. With this change, presently five of the six teams are from Germany, with one from the Netherlands, leading some of the league's detractors to refer to it as 'NFL Deutschland' or 'NFL Germany'; even speculating that the Admirals are only still in Holland because they won World Bowl XIII, and it wouldn't look good if the league moved its champions. German teams won all 7 World Bowl Championships between 1998 and 2004. In 2005 the total attendance at the thirty games was 568,935, and the average attendance of 18,965 was the highest since 1992.

==Experimental Rules==

The NFL Europe League is not only used to develop young players for the NFL: it is also used to test rule changes with the result that the rules of NFL Europe can be quite different to standard NFL rules. Sometimes these rules prove to be popular and go on to be adopted by the NFL. Others have remained confined to NFL Europe, something which on occasion has been a source of confusion among players. The most famous example is the 2-point conversion rule, in which the ball is passed or run into the endzone again following a touchdown instead of a kick between the uprights. This rule was tested in the World League before it was adopted it for the NFL in 1994. Other minor tweaks in gameplay, such as a shorter kickoff tee, were also first used in the WLAF.

The NFL has traditionally used a sudden-death format for overtime. Regular season games have a single period of overtime during which the first team to score goes on to win the game. If neither team scores, the games is declared a tie. In post-season games, overtime is extended indefinitely until one team scores. In NFL Europe, however, the overtime period lasts for 10 minutes with the requirement that each team must have the opportunity of possession at least once. So, in NFL Europe, it is possible for one team to score in overtime then have to kick-off to the opponent and give them a chance to either equalise or win the game (still possible on just one possession each; if one team scores a TD followed by an extra point, their opponents could still win by scoring a touchdown followed by a 2-point conversion). The winner is the team with the highest score after both teams have had possession. Only two games have ever remained tied after OT in WLAF/NFL Europe history: London Monarchs vs Birmingham Fire in Week 4 of the 1992 season, and Berlin Thunder at Hamburg Sea Devils, on [[April]] [[1]] [[2006]]. The score of both games was 17-17.

With [[football (soccer)]] being the traditionally popular sport in Europe and [[American Football]] being a relative newcomer, the rules were changed slightly to encourage a greater element of kicking which was intended to make the game more enjoyable for [[football]] and [[Rugby football|rugby]] fans. They did this by awarding 4 points to [[Field goal|field goals]] of more than 50 yards, as opposed to 3 points in the NFL. This has the interesting side-effect that a touchdown lead (7-points) can be overcome by one regular field goal (3-points) as well as a long field goal (4-points).

Also, there is a requirement that at least one player of Non-American extraction, referred to as "national" players, participate in every down for both teams as of the 2006 season (in previous seasons one was required to play only on every down of every other series). In addition to European players a number of Mexican and Japanese players have played as national players. Up until the 2004 season kicked conversion attempts and short field goals were attempted by national players. Since there are few European players who have had the chance to compete at a level comparable to U.S. [[College Football]] and the NFL, many of the most useful European players have prior experience in football or rugby so become Kickers in NFL Europe. This, in conjunction with the 4-point field goal rule, meant that, while European players were a small minority of players, they still had a significant involvement in scoring points.

==NFL Europe Teams (1995-Present)==

===Current teams===

{| border="1" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="0" class="wikitable"

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| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=18%| [[Image:NFLE_Admirals.gif|55px|center]][[Amsterdam Admirals]]

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=15%| [[Image:NFLE_Thunder.gif|55px|center]][[Berlin Thunder|Berlin Thunder]]

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=18%| [[Image:NFLE_Centurions.gif|55px|center]][[Cologne Centurions]]

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=16%| [[Image:NFLE_Galaxy.gif|55px|center]][[Frankfurt Galaxy]]

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=18%| [[Image:NFLE_SeaDevils.gif|55px|center]][[Hamburg Sea Devils|Hamburg Sea Devils]]

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=15%| [[Image:NFLE_Fire.gif|55px|center]][[Rhein Fire|Rhein Fire]]

|}

===Former teams===

{| border="1" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="0" class="wikitable"

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| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=25%| [[Image:NFLE_Claymores.gif|55px|center]][[Scottish Claymores]] (1995-2004)

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=25%| [[Image:NFLE_Dragons.gif|55px|center]][[Barcelona Dragons]] (1995-2003)

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=25%| [[Image:NFLE_Monarchs.gif|55px|center]][[London Monarchs]] (1991-1997)

| bgcolor="#ffffff" align="center" width=25%| [[Image:NFLE_EnglandMonarchs.gif|55px|center]][[London Monarchs|England Monarchs]] (1998)

|}

==See also==

*[[World Bowl]]

*[[List of leagues of American football]]

*[[Sports league attendances]]

*[[European NFL Stadiums|NFL Europe Stadiums]]

==External links==

* [http://www.nfleurope.com Official site]

* [http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/1871/ Unofficial page about the original WLAF]

* [http://www.fwl.org.uk Fantasy World League]

* [http://www.kenn.com/sports/football/nflel/index.html kenn.com] - source for the attendance figures given in the article.

* [http://two.fsphost.com/nfle/ NFL Europe Fan Site, following the league and Houston Texans Allocations]

* [http://www.hworth.net/nflel/indexNFLEL.html Historical Site Index for the NFL Europe League]

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[[Category:NFL Europe| ]]

[[Category:American football in Germany]]

[[Category:1995 establishments]]

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