{"id":36093,"date":"2025-07-31T23:35:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T23:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/36093\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T23:35:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T23:35:10","slug":"louis-rees-zammit-to-return-to-rugby-after-chasing-nfl-dream-its-time-to-come-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/36093\/","title":{"rendered":"Louis Rees-Zammit to return to rugby after chasing NFL dream: \u2018It\u2019s time to come home\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Louis Rees-Zammit<\/a> has announced that he will return to rugby 18 months after a shock decision to pursue his dream of playing in the NFL<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The 24-year-old made a stunning decision<\/a> on the eve of the 2024 Six Nations<\/a> to leave his boyhood sport behind and move to America via the NFL\u2019s International Player Pathway.<\/p>\n

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Rees-Zammit subsequently spent time with the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a> and Jacksonville Jaguars<\/a> but did not appear in a regular season game<\/a> for either side, and a month before the new campaign begins, he has left the Jaguars.<\/p>\n

A return to rugby now beckons for a player who had established himself as one of the brightest Welsh prospects before leaving the sport.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got an exciting announcement to make,\u201d Rees-Zammit said on social media. \u201cI\u2019ve decided to leave the NFL and return to rugby.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a great experience but it\u2019s time to come home. I\u2019ve decided that this is the best time to make this decision to give myself time to get everything in place for next season.<\/p>\n

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There\u2019s only one thing that\u2019s on my mind, that\u2019s coming back to rugby and doing what I do best. I can\u2019t explain how excited I am. There\u2019ll be more news to come soon but for now, see you soon rugby fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Louis<\/p>\n

Louis Rees-Zammit failed to crack the Kansas City Chiefs roster but featured in preseason (AP)<\/p>\n

Rees-Zammit made a rapid impression after becoming Gloucester\u2019s youngest ever Premiership player as an 18-year-old in 2018, and a Wales debut soon followed in 2020.<\/p>\n

A standout Six Nations in 2021 earned the youngster a trip with the British and Irish Lions<\/a> to South Africa later that year, though he did not feature on the wing in the Tests against the Springboks.<\/p>\n

His international career was put on pause after the 2023 Rugby World Cup with a tally of 14 tries in 32 Tests, but Rees-Zammit could now be back to bolster the Welsh squad for the November internationals.<\/p>\n

\"Louis<\/p>\n

Louis Rees-Zammit scored five tries for Wales during the 2023 Rugby World Cup (PA Wire)<\/p>\n

Wales<\/a> will begin life under a new head coach in Steve Tandy<\/a> having finally snapped their long losing run with a victory in Japan.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Louis Rees-Zammit has announced that he will return to rugby 18 months after a shock decision to pursue…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":36094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,32733,1237,1240,593,32732,85],"class_list":["post-36093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-international-player-pathway","tag-jacksonville-jaguars","tag-kansas-city-chiefs","tag-nfl","tag-shock-decision","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}