{"id":855241,"date":"2026-09-21T08:38:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T08:38:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/855241\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T08:38:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T08:38:10","slug":"its-about-to-go-global-american-college-football-rocks-into-wembley-a-photo-essay-college-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/855241\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018It\u2019s about to go global\u2019: American college football rocks into Wembley \u2013 a photo essay | College football"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rarely has Wembley Way seen or heard such a commotion. The famous 500-yard long concourse leading to the national (association) football stadium in London played host to a sea of raucous American football fans on Saturday, as they gathered to mark the first ever top-tier college football game on British turf.<\/p>\n

Pundits from Fox\u2019s Big Noon Kickoff Show were broadcasting live from outside the venue \u2013 a curious spectacle in which the hosts even ate fish and chips in front of a fake Grenadier guard \u2013 as thousands of supporters around them waved placards and chanted college anthems. It fuelled a tailgate party atmosphere that wouldn\u2019t have felt out of place in the States.<\/p>\n

Dubbed the Union Jack Classic<\/a>, the game pitted two sports-mad colleges, Kansas and Arizona State, against each other in front of 46,000 partisan fans, with many of the players one day hoping to play in the NFL.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot more grit and hunger in college football than in the NFL,\u201d said Trey Latham, an ambitious 22-year-old linebacker for Kansas, on the eve of the clash. \u201cCollege football teams go at it neck and neck. NFL players know they\u2019re already fed, but we\u2019re trying to feed our loved ones. There are scouts watching and people are desperate [to make it].\u201d<\/p>\n

Above: Pundits for the Fox Big Noon Kickoff Show discuss the game with both head coaches in a temporary studio built on Wembley Way. Below: Brady Quinn, Mark Ingram II, Matt Leinart and Urban Meyer eating fish and chips as they present the show, while fans wave placards. Click on the images to reveal individual photo captions.<\/p>\n

The only previous college football game to be staged in the UK was in 1988, when Richmond beat Boston University at Crystal Palace. And while 42 NFL games have been staged in the UK capital over the past 19 years, college football has remained absent.<\/p>\n

Thomas Hensey, co-founder of the Union Jack Classic, says the idea of bringing college football back to London had been rattling around his head for years, but it grew serious during a conversation at a famous British boozer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was over here at the Ted Lasso pub [the Prince\u2019s Head in Richmond] with Rob Yowell, who\u2019s one of the other partners, and I said \u2018I think it\u2019s time to bring college football here\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s 14 million American football fans in this country and four million of those are what they deem avid. That\u2019s a pretty large crowd. So we asked ourselves: \u2018Are we willing to risk everything at our stage in our careers for this?\u2019 And we said: \u2018Hell yes, we\u2019re all in!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Crucially, Kenny Dillingham, the Arizona State coach, was also keen, says Hensey. \u201cHe\u2019s a real character, a real visionary, and he said \u2018I\u2019ll play anyone, anywhere, anytime!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Above: Kansas marching band playing in the stands. Below: Fans, cheerleaders and Paige Blake, who played the national anthem on her electric guitar.<\/p>\n

The blueprint for the event was \u201cto take some of the best traditional game day dynamics \u2013 the marching bands, the cheerleaders \u2013 and then add a bit of rock and roll, a little country, a little hip hop, and turn it into a concert with an American football game stuck in the middle of it,\u201d says Hensey.<\/p>\n

The razzmatazz began when the players emerged on to the field amid a tunnel of fireworks, before Paige Blake played the US national anthem on an electric guitar.<\/p>\n

Every break in play was plugged with sound and colour as \u201cspirit squads\u201d including cheerleaders performed slick routines, while marching bands and American musicians brought even more energy to proceedings \u2013 leaving a footprint that will give the Wembley groundstaff a headache before England\u2019s football match (or should that be soccer match) with Spain next weekend.<\/p>\n

The game itself<\/a> was less eventful than the pageantry that surrounded it. Spanning more than three hours and 30 minutes, Arizona State won comfortably, despite the eventual 24-17 scoreline, with Jaren Hamilton running in a 100-yard kick-off return as the game swung decisively in their favour near the midway point.<\/p>\n

College football players are used to big stadia. All of the teams in the Big 12 conference, to which Kansas and Arizona State belong, average crowds of more than 30,000 per home game, and some, like Brigham Young University, can attract north of 60,000.<\/p>\n

But travelling to the UK and playing on the hallowed turf at Wembley was a unique thrill for the young players involved, the majority of whom didn\u2019t even own passports prior to the trip.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was my first time going out of the United States,\u201d said Kansas cornerback Jalen Todd. \u201cBeing from Detroit, I never expected to be playing football in the UK. Wembley is iconic.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the days before the game, both teams took a boat trip along the Thames and scaled Tower Bridge \u2013 the landmark that features on the Union Jack Classic winner\u2019s trophy \u2013 to give them inspiration.<\/p>\n

The Big 12 commissioner, Brett Yormark, says the event \u201cexceeded\u201d his expectations even though the crowd was well short of the anticipated 60,000, while Hensey says he is targeting a full stadium when they return with two new teams next year. \u201cI personally think college football is on the cusp of what the NFL was 20, 30 years ago, and it\u2019s about to go global,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For Dillingham, the greatest positive was the cultural impact of the trip on his players. \u201cWe had multiple players say \u2018I love this place, London is awesome, I want to come back and spend summer or Christmas out here.\u2019 It\u2019s an experience that I think everybody will remember for the rest of their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Above: Winning ASU head coach Kenny Dillingham talks to the media with his three-year-old son Kent on his shoulders. Below: Players from Arizona State and their mascot, Sparky, celebrate on the pitch with the trophy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rarely has Wembley Way seen or heard such a commotion. The famous 500-yard long concourse leading to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":855242,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-855241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/855241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=855241"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/855241\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/855242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=855241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=855241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=855241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}