Archive October 1, 2025

2025 NFL London games

Wembley Stadium and Tottenham Hotspur Stadium Dates: 5, 12, and 19 October Kick-offs: 14:30 BST

The NFL roadshow travels to England to extend this year’s record-setting run of international games following a fantastic weekend in Ireland.

Over the next three Sundays, London will host three international matches, with three of them taking place there.

The Pittsburgh Steelers held on for a heartfelt win over the Minnesota Vikings in Dublin’s first regular-season game on Sunday.

The Vikings are the first NFL team to play in two different countries simultaneously across the Irish Sea.

On Sunday, the Vikings’ receiver Justin Jefferson and Browns’ defensive end Myles Garrett take on the Cleveland Browns at Tottenham.

Given that their offensive line has been torn down by injuries, leaving backup quarterback Carson Wentz exposed, the Vikings made a wise threat to a late comeback against the Steelers.

Wentz will start in place of JJ McCarthy, who is out injured, in his third start and will face Myles Garrett, who has already recorded four sacks this year.

Cleveland are 1-3 overall after falling 34-10 to Detroit on Sunday, while Minnesota advanced to the play-offs last season with a 2-2 record.

After the veteran won a four-way quarterback contest to start for the Browns this year, that made veteran Joe Flacco subject to more scrutiny.

Dillon Gabriel was given the go-ahead, and fellow rookie Shedeur Sanders came in third place on the depth chart.

The third round of this year’s draft saw the selection of Gabriel, while Sanders, who was the first overall pick, saw a dramatic decline.

There was speculation that Cleveland would make an early change as a result of the team’s difficult start to the season, and Sanders last week claimed that he was aware of this and that he could do better.

Shedeur would start this season at some point, according to his father Deion, who is a two-time Super Bowl champion and his college coach at Colorado. That was just a few days after that.

After Sunday’s defeat, Stefanski remarked, “There are so many things we need to do better, both quarterback-wise,” but this is not about just one person.

Bo Nix was the Broncos’ starting quarterback the following year, and he might have won the offensive rookie of the year award for a spectacular season under Jayden Daniels.

Denver’s play-offs, for the first time since winning the Super Bowl in 2016, were led by Nix, who matured and maintained composure under coach Sean Payton’s leadership.

The 25-year-old showed no signs of letting go in his 28-3 victory over Cincinnati on Monday, where JK Dobbins, a new running back, did the damage.

The Broncos have cornerback Surtain II as their reigning Defensive Player of the Year while Dobbins has balanced the Denver offense.

They travel to Philadelphia to face a new-look Jets team hoping to end the Aaron Rodgers era and are currently 2-2.

Although they have a new head coach, quarterback, and general manager, little has changed since last year’s 5-12 finish. The Jets are one of three teams without a win in a game heading into week five.

The final London game will take place on October 19 at Wembley, with two teams that are currently 3-1 up against each other.

The Los Angeles Rams are viewed as dark horses this season despite having only three years since Denver’s most recent Super Bowl victory.

Only Dallas quarterback Dak Prescott has thrown for 114 yards, with Puka Nacua (the league’s leading receiver) and Davante Adams (the Jets’ starting quarterback) having the most passing yards.

The Jacksonville Jaguars made a bold move in the draft by trading up and selecting Travis Hunter with the second overall pick despite going 4-13 last year. They also named 34-year-old James Gladstone as their new head coach and head coach.

Hunter focuses on offense and defense, aiming to become the NFL’s first real two-way player since the 1990s and working with Colorado’s former college coach Deion Sanders.

The 22-year-old has yet to deliver on his breakout season, only completing 13 receptions for 118 yards.

Celtic vs. Sporting Braga in the Europa League

Glasgow’s Celtic Park Date: Thursday, October 2 Kick-off: 17:45 BST

Despite a positive start to their Europa League campaign, Braga arrive in Glasgow in somewhat depressed mood, much like Genk did last week against Rangers.

Fans who watched their team lose 1-0 to the Nacional of Madeira on Sunday, dropping to seventh in the Liga Portugal table after five games without winning in one of their home games, were unsatisfied with the matchday one victory over Feyenoord.

Carlos Vicens, the team’s new head coach, who has personally dealt with fan dissatisfaction, most recently the dreaded waving of the white handkerchiefs frequently seen in Iberian stands when hardship strikes, criticizes the players’ attitude.

Vicens’ rise is largely due to his apprenticeship at Manchester City, where he transitioned from a work experience position to his first full-time position coaching the under-12s and 13s before convincing Guardiola to call him in 2021.

Vicens wanted to break into the professional game after four years under the guidance of arguably the best coach in the field today. Braga, who had already parted company with Carlos Carvalhal, called.

A 0-0 draw away to Levski Sofia in his opening game of the Europa League, followed by a stingy victory at home against the Bulgarians, under the new boss, was a start.

However, Braga’s 4-1 overall victory over Cluj and its subsequent 2 3-0 league victories should be positive signs.

The play-off round featured the first signs of a stumble as Celtic drawn away from AVS, their only remaining playoff game of the year, but the result was as comfortable as it could have been against Celtic’s former adversaries, Lincoln Red Imps of Gibraltar.

The Braga have lost both of their previous four league games at home, drawing the fanfare of the team.

In such a setting, Celtic Park, where they previously lost on their only previous visit to the team in August 2010 while playing Champions League qualifying, were unable to overcome a 3-0 first-leg deficit.

The Champions League team’s third-place finish that year opened the door for their best European campaign, which they won in the Europa League and won the final against Celtic’s Porto, who won the competition in 2003.

Rangers stopped them in the quarter-finals of 2022, putting them in the final on their own. Their best performance since then was in 2022.

With only a goal behind Fenerbahce, who went on to lose to Rangers, last season’s victories over Maccabi Tel Aviv, Hoffenheim, and Lazio proved insufficient to get them to the knockout phase.

It’s unknown whether the squad for this year is any better prepared for success.

Pau Victor, a Spanish striker from Barcelona (approximately £10.5 million), and Mario Dorgeles, a young Ivory Coast midfielder from Nordsjaelland (£9.6 million), both made significant investments, but Dorgeles may miss the game because he hasn’t played in the last five games.

Former Scotland hooker Fraser Brown believes the club needs to develop “a whole new vision” before it can become regarded as a perennial underachievers.

The United Rugby Championship will be contested by head coach Sean Everitt and his team will finish in the top four this year, according to Paul Hill, who even suggested they might challenge for the title.

However, after a desperately bad opening weekend performance, the capital side was defeated by Zebre, who is typically one of the weakest teams in the competition.

According to Brown, “You look at the backdrop of Edinburgh rugby in a brilliant city with a huge rugby following, massive abundance of resources in terms of potential finance and support in the city,” the BBC Scotland Rugby Podcast said.

“Edinburgh Rugby has the potential to have a significant growth club if someone can get that done from the perspective of a managing director or head coach.”

However, I believe it will take a while, and you must give someone time to try to build a club with a completely new image.

That’s exactly what Edinburgh needs, according to someone who I thought about it probably two or three years ago.

After a poor start to the season, Everitt appeared to be under pressure before a late-season improvement in performances and results led to Edinburgh reaching the URC quarter-finals and the Challenge Cup semi-finals.

The South African’s contract expires at the end of the campaign, and he confirmed he hasn’t yet received a new deal offer from Scottish Rugby.

Everitt’s future may depend on what happens next, but Brown thinks that Edinburgh’s issues extend beyond just the head coach.

“Edinburgh seems to be choosing between a Mike Blair or Sean Everitt character,” Brown, who started his career with Edinburgh before establishing his reputation at Glasgow Warriors, and a Richard Cockerill character, which is constantly very authoritarian and very authoritarian.

They just seem to be unable to quite hit that middle-of-the-road sweet spot. You can’t help but notice that this squad is full of Scotland’s starting players.

Why can’t they get results, they ask? They can expect extraordinary outcomes. At the end of last season, we witnessed that in the run for the European play-offs, but they don’t seem to be able to maintain consistency week-over-week. That’s not just a coaching issue, in my opinion.