"I've already learned in a very short amount of time about many aspects of what makes Croke Park so, so special and an amazing venue… We’re gonna try to make the most of it.”
Minnesota Vikings bring big star power to Ireland's first ever NFL game
Minnesota Vikings safety Camryn Bynum does a backflip as he celebrates a fumble recovery. Pic: AP Photo/Mike Roemer.
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It seems fair to say that the Minnesota Vikings probably wasn’t the first team your average Irish NFL fan would have wanted as opposition for the Pittsburgh Steelers come September’s historic first-ever NFL game in Dublin.
But a close second? Very likely, given the list of likely contenders.
If the Packers are that bit more storied a franchise, that bit more successful in the modern era, and that bit better served with A-level quarterbacks down the years in Brett Favre, Aaron Rodgers and now Jordan Love, then Minneapolis’ finest are no slouches.
Yet to win a Super Bowl, the franchise has a 34-17 win-loss record under current head coach Kevin O’Connell with a difficult second season sandwiched by two excellent regular seasons either side curdled by a pair of wild card playoff defeats.
Last term saw them go 14-3 with the effective Sam Arnold at quarterback. Now they have first-round draft pick JJ McCarthy, a gunslinger in his Michigan college days, back from injury and Justin Jefferson must be licking his lips.
Jefferson is a star in a galaxy full of them. One of the top wide receivers in the entire league. Watching those two alone should be fun against a Steelers outfit whose calling card has always been a blue-collar defence.
Their glory days came in the 1970s but no-one can boast more Super Bowls than Pittsburgh’s six and they have remained a good if not great team throughout the reign of current chief Mike Tomlin who has won more games than he has lost in every one of his 18 seasons.
“The Pittsburgh Steelers are one of the historic franchises in the NFL,” said Vikings head coach O’Connell this week.
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Pittsburgh Steelers to face Minnesota Vikings in first regular-season NFL game in Dublin
"They've got a great coach in Mike Tomlin, somebody I know very well and have a ton of respect for.
“Always play great defense. They've really been able to build up through the acquisition of some players and free agency, build up their offensive side of the ball as well. And they're always gonna be physical.
“It's always gonna be four quarters of an absolute battle for really every inch of that football field to try to score points in, keep 'em out of the end zone. Then when you look at our team, it starts with our ability to, to play great football in all three phases.
“We do have some star power. Justin Jefferson, if fans don't know about him yet, they will very soon. Getting the opportunity to see the best receiver, the best wide receiver on the planet, in my opinion is a great start to get to know the Minnesota Vikings as well.
“When you think about opportunities to play in unique atmospheres and environments, that are experiences for your players, what better way to do that than to play in Dublin for the first time in the regular season, which is, which is a big deal to us. And then, like you mentioned, uh, the two week trip itself are.
“The two game trip, I should say, gives us a unbelievable opportunity to take our team on the road, get away from a lot of the day-to-day things that maybe pull the players in any other direction. Then we're on the road together. It feels almost like a training camp. It allows us to come together closer than ever.”
Minnesota boast the best record of any team in these ‘International Series’ games. Played four, won four. That will be tested this season when they follow their Croke Park date with a game against the Cleveland Browns in the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium a week later.
No team has played abroad two weeks in a row in different countries before.
If it’s a tough schedule then it probably beats having to face the ‘Terrible Towels’ in Pittsburgh, and then the denizens of the Browns’ Dawg Pound in Ohio. And that much time on the road can be a bonding experience for a team too.
“Well, you can look at [the European trip] as two separate opportunities,” said O’Connell. “The success we've had previously has been on a pretty similar schedule where we've left at a certain time, arrived at a certain time and then, you know, handled our preparation accordingly.
“We'll probably still do that for the initial trip to Dublin. and then I believe whatever it is, an hour, hour-15 minute flight to the UK. We'll then transition to kind of a different mindset where we'll have the full week of preparation on site leading into the game there.
“So we can build a variety of different paths to get there, but what we're gonna do for each game is to try to give our players the best chance to be at their best and put on a great show for the fans over there seeing something in the regular season for the first time in Dublin.”
With a name like O’Connell there are Irish connections of his own to be mined should be of a mind to do so before the game itself and, if this is a business trip first and foremost, then the 39-year old sounds open to a more holistic approach when they land.
How long the Vikings spend on the ground in Ireland remains to be seen given the length of their European leg in total but their head coach has already heard something of Croke Park and its history and is open to knowing more before September 8th.
“It would be very easy to just say, ‘Hey, it's just another game’, which may be our preparation for the actual football, our opponent. You know, study the Xs and Os, prepare our players as individual players, but also offense, defense and special teams.
“That's one thing, but then it would be shortsighted by me as the head coach to not really engage in learning about the great history. I've already learned in a very short amount of time about many aspects of what makes Croke Park so, so special and an amazing venue… We’re gonna try to make the most of it.”
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