Wembley Stadium is in the NRL’s crosshairs as they continue to plan out their proposed global round.
That’s according to ARL Commission chairman Peter V’Landys, who has big plans for the start of the 2027 NRL season.
The NRL campaign has started in Las Vegas for the last three years, with two games being played at the Allegiant Stadium during a rugby league takeover of Sin City. The Super League has been involved for the last two seasons, with Hull KR and Leeds Rhinos the two sides representing the Northern Hemisphere competition in Vegas this weekend and that agreement is set to continue into next year and potentially beyond.
However, the success of the Vegas venture has the NRL thinking bigger and plans of a global round emerged last year, with the opening round of the NRL potentially set to be played out all over the world.
Whether that comes to fruition in 12 months’ time remains to be seen, but V’landys is aiming big and he has pinpointed London’s Wembley as a potential host venue, as well as cities in Asia and North America.
“We want a global round. We want to go right around the world,” V’landys told Fox while out in Vegas this week.
“We’re looking at Wembley Stadium, we’re looking at Abu Dhabi, Japan, Hong Kong and even Miami.
“I think people will add this occasion as a part of their holiday… We’re giving them bucket list items to attend.
“You have to have ambition. If you don’t have ambition, you’ll just stay still.”
On the growing success of the NRL’s Vegas venture, he added: “This is the biggest Australian contingent we’ve ever had. Close to 20,000 have made the trip and another 10,000 from England… We’ve basically taken over Las Vegas.
“Everyone looked at us blankly when we said we were going to Vegas and 20,000 people later, look how successful it is.
“It has exceeded my expectations. I expected us to get three or four thousand Australians but to end up getting 20,000 it’s unbelievable.”
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Wiganexpat
February 26, 2026 at 7:35 pm
I would love to look at how successful Las Vegas is but the NRL / Superleague never publish any financials around it. Sure they point at crowds etc but you can pack out anywhere if you pay everyone to be there. Why the secrecy ? We are league fans, we are not out to bash you and understand the concept of a loss leader. Come on boys – how successful is it really ?
Eric T Cat
February 26, 2026 at 8:02 pm
Wembley – make 50,000 of us traipse to London to join a few thousand in the south, stadium looks empty or play it at the new Everton Stadium, Man City, or even Newcastle United Ground, packed out to a full stadium.
They should learn from playing at the KCOM last week, sold out, baying crowd, incredible atmosphere!
Wiganexpat
March 5, 2026 at 1:26 pm
Yeah, understand where you are coming from but PVL is playing a completely different game. He is after globalisation of the NRL. He wants massive growth. What he does not want is just more M62 thinking. As he sees it, that is half of the SL problem. I think he is more likely to play a game in Paris than he is London. He is investing in France and Biensports have just interviewed Abdo in Sydney. Paris fits with his globalisation plan while the superleague continues to squabble amongst themselves. If SL says no to giving up control, we could see PVL forming his own NRL EUROPE and some SL clubs could jump ship.
The big cash is in broadcast rights and SL is being screwed by Sky. Linking up with the NRL could just transform Superleague. This year, the NRL had revenue of 850m (about 400m pounds) and PVL regards that as small beer. He is aiming for that to be over 1bn AUD by 2030 and the way he is going, that target will be easy. Why wouldn’t SL want to hitch up to that ?