Cowboys-Ravens Rio Game Faces Maracanã Turf Concerns — SkimNews
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- The NFL scheduled its first game in Rio de Janeiro for Week 3, with the Dallas Cowboys and Baltimore Ravens set to play at Maracanã Stadium on Sept. 27 at 4:25 p.m. ET on CBS
- Flamengo players Giorgian De Arrascaeta and goalkeeper Agustín Rossi publicly criticized the deteriorating surface, with Rossi telling A to Z that both penalty areas have bumps everywhere and 'it's unbelievable that we're playing on a field like this'
- The NFL is 'aware' of potential field issues per Pro Football Talk, but cannot begin remediation until Monday at the earliest because Maracanã still hosts a Flamengo match on Sept. 20
- Maracanã released social-media footage showing groundskeeping company Greenleaf working to repair grass damage worsened by recent rain between Flamengo matches
- The 2024 Eagles-Packers opener at Arena Corinthians in São Paulo, the first NFL game in Brazil, also drew postgame field-condition complaints from players on both teams
- The Sept. 27 game marks the third consecutive year the NFL has staged a regular-season contest in Brazil
Why it matters: The NFL's third straight year of Brazilian games is running into the same field-quality problem that dogged the 2024 Eagles-Packers opener, and with Flamengo still playing home matches at Maracanã through Sept. 20, the league has roughly one week to resod or patch the surface before kickoff — a tight turnaround that could force last-minute decisions about the historic Rio debut.
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