JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville Jaguars have back-to-back games coming up in London, but their trip to England will be “slightly” delayed, a team spokesperson said.
The team’s departure was pushed back because of Hurricane Milton, which brought powerful winds, a deadly storm surge and flooding to much of Florida after making landfall along the Gulf Coast as a Category 3 storm.
It’s unclear when the team will be able to take off for the trip across the pond.
When the Jaguars do arrive overseas, they will check into The Grove Hotel and get to make themselves at home as the team will not have to change hotels after Sunday, like they had to do last season.
“It’ll be nice,” Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson said. “Unload your bag and you make that home for the next week and a half. It’s great after the game. Come right back there. It’s your room and your stuff and you get ready for the next week.”
The Jaguars are the “away” team for their first London game, which is against the Chicago Bears. They will play at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium at 9:30 a.m.
The Jaguars will act as the home team hosting the New England Patriots on October 20. Kickoff is also slated for 9:30 a.m. ET. This will be the first time backup quarterback Mac Jones faces his former team that drafted him 15th overall in the 2021 NFL Draft.
A flight to London last season was referenced in a lawsuit brought upon former Jaguars kicker Brandon McManus that alleged he sexually assaulted two female flight attendants. While the civil lawsuit is still ongoing in Duval Circuit Civil Court, the NFL’s investigation found insufficient evidence that McManus violated the league’s personal conduct policy.
Jaguars coach Doug Pederson was asked if the team has made any changes to the team’s travel procedures after the lawsuit.
“I think it’s important for everybody that travels with us, whether they’re part of the team or they’re apart of the business staff,” Pederson said. “That’s an extension of our building. That’s an extension of, really, NFL property. We make it clear to everybody that there’s a certain way we travel. And we have to respect who our owner – our owner allows us to travel a certain way and travel extremely well. We’ve got to respect that. We revisited, back in training camp when we went to Atlanta in the first preseason game. You just continue to revisit the policy, the NFL policies, our policies on how we travel, and we’ve had good trips so far.”
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