World Bowl

For the 1974 championship game of the World Football League, see World Bowl (WFL).

The World Bowl was the annual American football championship game of the World League of American Football/NFL Europe. The World Bowl was played each year from 1991 to 2007 (except 1993 and 1994).

The game was conceived as the final of the NFL-related spring league, the World League. The first World Bowl was played in 1991 in London. With the 1995 relaunch of the World League with the North American teams removed, all subsequent World Bowls were played in Europe between European clubs. The only World Bowl to take place outside Europe was World Bowl '92 in Montreal, Canada.

The World Bowl trophy was a globe made of glass measuring 35.5 cm (14 inches) in diameter and weighing 18.6 kg (41 lbs).

Overview

When the World League of American Football (WLAF) was founded in 1991, with teams in North America and Europe as well as expansion plans for Asia, the name World Bowl was appropriate. The name was kept after 1995 when the league limited itself exclusively to Europe.

From 1995 to 1997, the World Bowl venue was decided by the standings after five weeks of the 10-week season. In other years, the sites were predetermined before the season. The 2002 World Bowl was hosted in Rhein Fire's hometown of Düsseldorf as a farewell to the old Rheinstadion. After the new LTU Arena (now Merkur Spiel-Arena) was completed, the 2005 World Bowl was hosted there again. It would return in 2006, the first time that the game was played in the same site in consecutive years. As the city's Fortuna Düsseldorf team spent much of this time in lower tiers of the German soccer pyramid, Düsseldorf was the rare NFL Europe city in which American football held an arguably competitive position.

Nine World Bowls were played on Saturdays and six World Bowls were played on Sundays (1991, 1996–1999, 2000).

World Bowl (WLAF, NFL Europe, and NFL Europa Championships)

Date		Venue	Winner	Score	Runner-Up	Attendance	MVP
June 9, 1991	World Bowl '91	Wembley Stadium, London, United Kingdom	London Monarchs	21 – 0	Barcelona Dragons	61,108	Dan Crossman Monarchs, Safety
June 6, 1992	World Bowl '92	Olympic Stadium, Montreal, Canada	Sacramento Surge	21 – 17	Orlando Thunder	43,789	David Archer Surge, QB
1993	League suspended
1994
June 17, 1995	World Bowl '95	Olympisch Stadion, Amsterdam, Netherlands	Frankfurt Galaxy	26 – 22	Amsterdam Admirals	23,847	Paul Justin Galaxy, QB
June 23, 1996	World Bowl '96	Murrayfield Stadium, Edinburgh, United Kingdom	Scottish Claymores	32 – 27	Frankfurt Galaxy	38,982	Yo Murphy Claymores, WR
June 22, 1997	World Bowl '97	Estadi Olimpic, Barcelona, Spain	Barcelona Dragons	38 – 24	Rhein Fire	31,100	Jon Kitna Dragons, QB
June 14, 1998	World Bowl '98	Waldstadion, Frankfurt, Germany	Rhein Fire	34 – 10	Frankfurt Galaxy	47,846	Jim Arellanes Fire, QB
June 27, 1999	World Bowl '99	Rheinstadion, Düsseldorf, Germany	Frankfurt Galaxy	38 – 24	Barcelona Dragons	39,643	Andy McCullough Galaxy, WR
June 25, 2000	World Bowl 2000	Waldstadion, Frankfurt, Germany	Rhein Fire	13 – 10	Scottish Claymores	35,860	Aaron Stecker Claymores, RB
June 30, 2001	World Bowl IX	Amsterdam ArenA, Amsterdam, Netherlands	Berlin Thunder	24 – 17	Barcelona Dragons	32,116	Jonathan Quinn Thunder, QB
June 22, 2002	World Bowl X	Rheinstadion, Düsseldorf, Germany	Berlin Thunder	26 – 20	Rhein Fire	53,109	Dane Looker Thunder, WR
June 14, 2003	World Bowl XI	Hampden Park, Glasgow, United Kingdom	Frankfurt Galaxy	35 – 16	Rhein Fire	28,138	Jonas Lewis Galaxy, RB
June 12, 2004	World Bowl XII	Arena AufSchalke, Gelsenkirchen, Germany	Berlin Thunder	30 – 24	Frankfurt Galaxy	35,413	Eric McCoo Thunder, RB
June 11, 2005	World Bowl XIII	LTU arena, Düsseldorf, Germany	Amsterdam Admirals	27 – 21	Berlin Thunder	35,134	Kurt Kittner Admirals, QB
May 27, 2006	World Bowl XIV	LTU arena, Düsseldorf, Germany	Frankfurt Galaxy	22 – 7	Amsterdam Admirals	36,286	Butchie Wallace Galaxy, RB
June 23, 2007	World Bowl XV	Commerzbank-Arena, Frankfurt, Germany	Hamburg Sea Devils	37 – 28	Frankfurt Galaxy	48,125	Casey Bramlet Sea Devils, QB

• Note: Roman numerals were not officially used by NFL Europe until World Bowl IX. Before 2001, the games were titled with the current year, such as World Bowl 2000.

Team records

Team	Won	Played	Winning years	Runner-up years
Frankfurt Galaxy	4	8	1995, 1999, 2003, 2006	1996, 1998, 2004, 2007
Berlin Thunder	3	4	2001, 2002, 2004	2005
Rhein Fire	2	5	1998, 2000	1997, 2002, 2003
Barcelona Dragons	1	4	1997	1991, 1999, 2001
Amsterdam Admirals	1	3	2005	1995, 2006
Scottish Claymores	1	2	1996	2000
Hamburg Sea Devils	1	1	2007
London Monarchs	1	1	1991
Sacramento Surge	1	1	1992
Orlando Thunder	0	1		1992
Cologne Centurions	0	0
Birmingham Fire	0	0
San Antonio Riders	0	0
Montreal Machine	0	0
New York/New Jersey Knights	0	0
Raleigh–Durham Skyhawks	0	0
Ohio Glory	0	0

Results by country

Team	Won	Played
Germany	10	18
United Kingdom	2	3
Catalunya	1	4
Netherlands	1	3
United States	1	2
Canada	0	0

Hosting cities

City	No. hosted	Years hosted
Düsseldorf	4	1999, 2002, 2005, 2006
Frankfurt	3	1998, 2000, 2007
Amsterdam	2	1995, 2001
London	1	1991
Montreal	1	1992
Edinburgh	1	1996
Barcelona	1	1997
Glasgow	1	2003
Gelsenkirchen	1	2004

While the Olympic stadiums in Montreal, Amsterdam and Barcelona hosted World Bowls, the league never selected Berlin as a host town, though the city's Thunder played in the Olympiastadion from 2003 to 2007.

Other uses of "World Bowl"

The former World Football League, a short-lived 1970s competitor to the NFL, was the first to name its championship game the World Bowl. In World Bowl I, the only WFL World Bowl contested, the Birmingham Americans defeated the Florida Blazers 22–21 on December 5, 1974, at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama. The game had been scheduled to be played at the Gator Bowl Stadium in Jacksonville, Florida, but after the Jacksonville Sharks folded mid-season, the league decided that the team with the better record would host the game.

The proposed World Indoor Football League that was to begin play in 1988 also intended on calling its championship the World Bowl. It would have been played on August 29, 1988. However, the WIFL disbanded 11 days before its season was to begin.