A few weeks ago, the NFL designed a study, which now, four days after American football’s main rivalry landed at the Santiago Bernabéu with Sunday’s match between the Miami Dolphins and Washington Commanders (15:30, DZN), has taken on an unusual turn. In its in-depth analysis, the North American League calculated that it has 11.3 million fans in Spain, in other words, one in four Spaniards follow the NFL.
This huge figure, revealed by the cooperation through the closeness of the party, has generated some controversy in the preamble of the first official citation of the NFL in Spain, but also through the words of Peter O’Reilly, executive vice president in charge of the international expansion of the league: “Our goal must be to deepen this base of 11 million followers.”
However, everything has an explanation. “This study includes both the closest fans, that is, those who follow the league from week to week, as well as those who are only interested in the Super Bowl (the decisive duel for the title) or those who still do not have their own team in the NFL,” justify EL PAÍS sources close to the competition.
Regardless of the estimates, the arrival of the great American sport in the Spanish capital, and more specifically in the home of Real Madrid – which in 2023 gained strength in the Metropolitano due to its connection to the center of the capital – responds to the value of a market, the Spanish language, that is increasingly attractive to achieve numbers on the other side of the Atlantic.
For example: Tickets for Sunday’s game, the 11th of the 17th regular-season lineup for the Dolphins and Commanders, went on sale in July (two days earlier, on June 26, the NFL had facilitated a pre-sale for Santander Bank customers). Prices ranged between €85 and €395, with the cheapest being mostly in locations with low visibility. About 650,000 people were trapped in the virtual arena and the sales platform collapsed, draining the bulk of tickets in more than four hours for a forum at the Bernabeu, which can accommodate 80,000 spectators.
In the afternoon, this is when the rematch comes into play, banned in Spain but lurking on the web or on the streets of nowhere in the hours before every major sporting event. At the time of publishing this text, digital platforms such as Melanuncius We welcome dozens of offers through which users can sell pins or pens for more than two thousand euros and give tickets to the NFL meeting at the Bernabéu. A large number, yes, but fewer than the number of tour operators who sought to do August with fans who wanted to attend a historic event. On platforms like OnLocationBased in the US, Dolphins-Commanders travel, hotel and ticket packages start at €3,600.
However, the NFL expects – and wants equal shares – that about 90% of Sunday’s spectators are home fans, who are residents of Spain.
In this case, the Community of Madrid and the Metropolitan City Council agreed to invest €3.3 million to promote the event (€1.5 million for the government of Isabel Díaz Ayuso; more than €1.8 million for José Luis Martínez Almeida). The expectation of both institutions, as well as the NFL itself, is that the clash between the Dolphins and the Leaders this Sunday generates a revenue of €16 million for Madrid, an estimate that is intangible until the party concludes, and persists on paper through fickle variables such as the impact of the event’s publicity.
In London, for example, the NFL has held 27 ceremonies since 2007, generating a total impact of €216 million for the city, or about eight million euros per match. Altogether, in a city with a population three times that of Madrid. But in Munich, the 2022 party between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Seattle Seahawks generated about 70 million euros, an unprecedented ball that was helped, in a large way, by the presence of Tom Brady, certainly the greatest player in the history of his sport.
The winner of seven Super Bowls will not be on the Bernabeu stage, nor will he be seen in the media, but the NFL has spent years looking to Spain, and this Sunday, at last, there will be a movement that will continue to expand its brand across all American borders. At the moment, the relationship with Madrid is one year old, if both parties agree in the intention of repeating it on at least other occasions. The agreement, in fact, signed up to the date signed in 2019 by Daniel Levy, president of Tottenham, who renovated his stadium in London to adapt it to a major show in North America and signed an exclusive exploitation contract that has since guaranteed 85 million euros per year.
In Madrid, Dolphins and Commanders organize events every month at different strategic points in the capital to warm up the atmosphere ahead of the 62nd international competition on Sunday. “Anyway, the only day of Major League Soccer in Spain is November 17,” assumes Rafa de los Santos, competition director in our country. Then, when the Bernabéu closes its doors after a night that brought together so many diverse interests, the street begins to transform.
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