Our photographer, Tom Jenkins, captures the colour and razzmatazz as college football arrived in the capital, hot on the heels of successful NFL outings in recent years.
R arely has Wembley Way seen or heard such a commotion. The famous 500-yard long concourse leading to the national 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.
Pundits from Fox’s Big Noon Kickoff Show were broadcasting live from outside the venue – a spectacle in which the hosts even ate fish and chips on a temporary set that included a fake Grenadier guard and an old red phone box – as thousands of supporters around them waved placards and chanted college anthems.
Dubbed the Union Jack Classic, the game pitted two sports-mad colleges, Kansas and Arizona State, against each other in front of 46,000 fans, with many of the players one day hoping to play in the NFL.
“There’s a lot more grit and hunger in college football than in the NFL,” said Trey Latham, a 22-year-old linebacker for Kansas, on the eve of the clash.
The only previous college football game to be staged in the UK was in 1988, when Richmond beat Boston University at Crystal Palace.
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.