VICTORIOUS HEAD COACH Mike Tomlin set the table.
“Before I even get to the game, I just can’t express enough the reception that we got here,” said Tomlin, who coached the Pittsburgh Steelers to Super Bowl success in 2008. “The hospitality, the accommodations, the service — it was all top-notch, man. It’s an honour to represent American football here in Dublin.”
It ran deeper, though, than the cursory accommodation in Dublin. The night before Sunday’s landmark occasion at Croke Park, the Steelers had a team meeting at Carton House. To any player unfamiliar, their head coach espoused the virtues of the late Dan Rooney, the former US ambassador to Ireland whose dream was realised on Sunday as the Pittsburgh took to the field at Croke Park for the first ever NFL regular-season game to take place in Ireland.
Tomlin, the hard-hitting veteran coach — considered among the league’s most impregnable figures — was in tears as he recalled “Ambassador Rooney”, the part-owner alongside whom he worked for a decade and whose family still retains ownership of the Steelers.
“I know he’s smiling at us today, man,” said the Steelers boss. “It’s just an honour, man, to fulfill his vision to bring NFL football to Dublin.
“I’ve been thinking about him a lot on a personal level so I’d be remiss if I didn’t say that.”
His message resonated: the Steelers, who vowed all week that the Rooney familiy would enjoy victory in Ireland’s first ever NFL regular-season game, turned up like men possessed, upsetting the Minnesota Vikings to move to 3-1 for the season.
“I thought the atmosphere was outstanding,” said Steelers quarterback, Aaron Rodgers. “I come out early… In most NFL stadiums, there’s two hours when the stadium opens and it starts to trickle in. Somebody came back into the locker room at like 11am and goes, ‘Man, there’s a ton of people out there already.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, we’re not in the States anymore. This is a different type of fan.’
“I loved it. I thought the crowd was fantastic. A lot of terrible towels there, but I felt like there was probably some good old Irish getting in the mix, too, waving those towels around a little bit. The music was great. The fans were cool. The field was pristine. I thought the field was really, really good. Conditions were good.
“The whole experience was fantastic. Shout out to the country and everybody who made this happen,” Rodgers added. “Win or lose, I would have said the same thing. I just felt like the reception from the people here was outstanding.”
As he had exited the field following the Steelers’ 24-21 victory over the Vikings, Rodgers made the case for the NFL to return to Ireland in 2026.
“I wish we could come back,” Rodgers told one of the Steelers’ in-house content creators as he jogged off the field on 41-year-old legs. “Next year.”
While the Steelers beat writers were besotted with Croke Park — which they couldn’t believe sits ‘literally in a neighbourood’ — they took Rodgers to task on a comment from earlier in the week in which he said he would have preferred to have travelled to Ireland on Monday and made a week of the new experience rather than landing in on Friday.
After taking aim at ESPN for what he claimed was a misattribution of his thoughts on the matter, Rodgers clarified: “I would always love to get on the timeframe that you’re in, the time zone, and get to enjoy the area a little bit more — especially with Ireland.
“The history of ancestors I had from this region, but also just hearing about the country and what it’s like, and being able to see some stuff would’ve been great.
“That is obviously not the focus. It’s a business trip, we understand that. But being the older guy, being around a long time, I just would’ve loved one time out of these three (previous games outside of the USA) to have an entire week to do it.
“But again”, Rodgers added, “no complaints about the three days we spent here. My only desire is for more time with you great Irish people, that’s all.”
When asked whether Dublin should play host to another NFL fixture next season, Rodgers replied curtly: “100%, yes.”
It was a short trip but from the moment we landed… the security guys over at the Carton House were hilarious. The Guinness was good in downtown Dublin. It’ll be a nice flight back with hopefully a yearly return by us or two other teams.
Rodgers’ sentiments were echoed by his Steelers teammates, with star defensive tackle Cam Heyward laying bare the extent to which the Pittsburgh players recognised the significance of breaking new ground in Ireland.
The Steelers were founded in 1933 by Art Rooney, the descendant of Irish immigrants who moved to the USA during The Great Famine. And seven-time Pro Bowler Heyward, a veteran five years’ Rodgers’ junior, said that his side had found the perfect landing spot for an international game in 2025.
“I could tell Art Rooney was very excited about this game,” Heyward said of the Steelers’ current part-owner.
He was carrying around his hurling stick and he was explaining that sacred ground we got to play in, and the importance of this game to the family.
“I think that resonates with a lot of our players.
“But Mr. Rooney… I think we were all very thankful to have this game here. I think before they even announced it, ‘Do we go to here? Do we go to Mexico?’ I just felt like, ‘Man, if we got a chance to play [in Ireland] in future…’ This is a game we always circled on our calendar.”
“We definitely had a chip on our shoulder,” added future Hall of Fame linebacker TJ Watt.
The 30-year-old, a league-wide star, celebrated an interception by trying to boot the ball over the bar Gaelic football-style. And like Tomlin and Rodgers, he understood the mission as it arose across the Atlantic.
“Mike T [Tomlin], before last night, gave a big speech on the importance of the Rooney family here in Ireland,” said Watt. “Mr. Rooney and his ambassadorship here and how important this game means to their family… We take a lot of pride in that, and to go out and play Steeler football was huge.
“I was so impressed with the fans knowing when to cheer, especially when we were on defence.
“It was huge for us, and that definitely gave us an edge today.”
