Ninh explains … Imposters! The sports teams that don’t play in their city.
It’s easy to assume that sports teams are named after their city they play in, but sometimes
that really isn’t the case. In a strange twist of fate, some of the most famous sports
teams in the world, are imposters. Because they don’t play in the city (or sometimes
even the state) that they’re named after.
Take for example the New York Giants and the New York Jets. It’s in their name, they
play in New York right?! Wrong! Not only do they not play in New York City, they don’t
even play in New York state. They both famously play their home games at MetLife stadium in
East Rutherford, New Jersey. False advertising, totally.
But one team that does play in New York is the Buffalo Bills … but they don’t actually
play in Buffalo. Rather, they play 14 miles away in Orchard Park. They’ll argue that
they do play in Buffalo …. but it’s something that you can easily wind them up about.
Another team that doesn’t play in their own state is the Washington Redskins, who
don’t actually play in DC, but 11.6 miles away in Landover, Maryland.
The Dallas Cowboys. They don’t play in Dallas either and haven’t done for quite some time.
Their previous stadium was in Irving, and their new stadium is in Arlington, 18 miles
from Downtown Dallas. And speaking of which, their other football team, FC Dallas plays
its home games 27 miles away in Frisco.
The Atlanta Braves did play in Atlanta, but have now moved to Cumberland, Georgia. 10
miles away from Atlanta.
The Los Angeles Chargers play in Carson, CA – 16 miles away from Downtown Los Angeles.
But eventually they and the LA Rams will play their games in SoFi stadium in Inglewood,
California – which is 13 miles from Downtown and technically isn’t classed as part of
the City of Los Angeles.
And whilst we’re talking about technicalities, the Las Vegas Raiders new stadium on the strip
is technically located in Paradise, Nevada … not Las Vegas. You too Golden Knights!
But one thing that isn’t a technicality is the San Francisco 49ers, who hilariously
play their games at Levi’s stadium, some 43.6 miles away in Santa Clara. It’s closer
to San Jose than it is to San Francisco, and that’s like playing your home games in Northampton
and being called Coventry City … oh wait, that happened already.
So, whilst we’re talking about the other kind of football, how about some cases in
England?
Well …
Liverpool don’t play in Liverpool, and Everton don’t play in Everton. Instead, Everton
plays its home games in Walton, just outside the Everton boundary. And Liverpool plays
it’s home games in the district of Anfield, which is not classed as Liverpool City Centre.
And before I get haters trying to correct me, it’s even on their official postal addresses.
So suck it.
Rather perversely, even though Manchester City and Manchester United are almost exactly
the same distance from the centrepoint of the City of Manchester, Manchester City plays
in Manchester, whereas Manchester United doesn’t. In a strange technicality, their stadium Old
Trafford is situated in the Borough of Trafford, in a district called Old Trafford, which is
down the street from a Cricket stadium … also called ‘Old Trafford’. So confusing! And
when Manchester City fans taunt United by saying that the “city is theirs”, it’s
technically true in the most bizarre case you can imagine.
Brighton and Hove Albion, doesn’t play in Brighton OR Hove. But quite some distance
from either one.
Tottenham fans with argue that Arsenal play 11 miles away from their actual home in Woolwich,
but they’re technically not called ‘Woolwich Arsenal’ anymore, so that doesn’t count.
Bolton Wanderers hilariously doesn’t play anywhere near Bolton, as their stadium is
technically located in the town of Horwich - 5.5 miles away. The reason why that’s
funny is because they’re closer to the centre of the town of arch-rivals Wigan than they
are to the town that they actually represent.
Barnet, doesn’t play in Barnet, that’s 7 miles away.
And Grimsby doesn’t play technically in Grimsby, but in nearby Cleethorpes.
But the most extreme case, is Liverpool Football Club. No, not the one that we already mentioned,
but this one.
This particularly football club was named after the same city as this one, except that
this team plays its home games at Estadio Belvedere … 6,880 miles away, in Uruguay.
Guys, just change the name already …!
Is there any more that you’ve come across that I didn’t mention here?
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Ninh Ly – www.ninh.co.uk - @NinhLyUK