Great Britain's departure from the European Union "will make it easier for London to have an NFL franchise by removing some of the legal obstacles," NFL UK Managing Dir Alistair Kirkwood said on Wednesday, according to Alan Baldwin of REUTERS. Kirkwood said that such a franchise was "viable and realistic but with plenty of hurdles yet to overcome." He added, "The interesting thing about the decision to leave the EU, and I don't want to get political whilst there's loads of things that we don't know, is that it actually makes a franchise in London easier to put up." Kirkwood "pointed in particular to current EU-related issues with the NFL's revenue-sharing model and drafting of players in a closed league." He said, "If we were to put more than one (franchise in Europe), the contraventions would potentially be serious enough that we'd then have to change how we operate, which I don't think is likely, or go back to the drawing board. (Brexit) has definitely made an objective that is still quite complex to see how we actually get to it ... a lot easier" (REUTERS, 9/6).
