Seahawks to play first London game in franchise history

As expected, the Seattle Seahawks were named amongst the group of teams scheduled to play in the NFL’s international series in England in 2018 Thursday. Seattle will take on the Oakland Raiders in Tottenham Hotspur’s new stadium at the site of White Hart Lane in North London, on October 14. The game will count as a Raiders home game, and likely signals the Seahawks get a bye the following week, although the rest of the schedule is not set.

The trip marks the first ever game overseas for the club, although Seattle was previously scheduled to participate in a preseason game against the New England Patriots in Beijing, China, in 2007 before that exhibition got canceled. Oakland played in London in 2014 and has been in two games in Mexico City each of the past two seasons.

Although it’s a boon to the Seahawks that they don’t sacrifice a home date while playing internationally, they do lose a West Coast visit and still have two games in the eastern time zone against the Carolina Panthers and Detroit Lions. That also makes it somewhat a shame that the Raiders lose out on one of their final eight games in front of their home fans before moving to Las Vegas in 2019. The NFL really doesn’t care for Oakland it turns out.

The contest in London could be the first consequential rematch between the Seahawks and their former running back Marshawn Lynch. Lynch has one more year remaining on his Raiders contract, but Lynch is notoriously capricious and may end up retiring again before the next season, or not bother to make the international flight even if he is on the Oakland roster at the time.

The other two NFL games in London in 2018 will be the Philadelphia Eagles against the Jacksonville Jaguars, and the Los Angeles Chargers against the Tennessee Titans.