Jaguars move across town to host the Texans

The NFL’s three-week London residency crosses town on Sunday, leaving the polished steel bowl of Tottenham Hotspur Stadium for the old familiar arches of Wembley. The Jacksonville Jaguars will make the short trip after spending the entire week in England. The Houston Texans landed Friday morning after an overnight flight, a delay of more than two hours and a last-minute change of aircraft. One team has settled in. The other has barely unpacked.

Jacksonville arrives with momentum

Jacksonville arrives at 4-1 after stealing a 19-17 win from the Philadelphia Eagles at Tottenham. Philadelphia went ahead with eight seconds left, Ameer Abdullah returned the kickoff 53 yards and Cam Little kicked a 57-yard field goal with one second remaining. It was the first game of the Super Bowl era in which both teams scored go-ahead points in the final 10 seconds. Not a bad way to change postcodes.

For the Jaguars, Wembley is less a neutral venue than a second home. They are 8-7 in the United Kingdom, have played 11 times at Wembley since 2013 and are trying to win two London games in the same season for the second time. Houston has seen this film before, however. The Texans beat Jacksonville 26-3 at Wembley in 2019, using the same arrive-on-Friday plan they have dusted off this week.

Houston battles the body clock

That plan has included early bedtimes and blue-light glasses. Director of wellness Ladd Harris began shifting the players’ sleep schedules before the flight, while the team charter provided lie-flat seats for the overnight crossing. DeMeco Ryans insists that none of it matters once the ball is kicked. Fair enough. But Jacksonville has had a week to find the coffee machine and Houston has had roughly 48 hours to persuade its body clock that 8:30 a.m. Texas time is football time. Will blue lights and early bedtimes save the Texans from a jet-lagged ass whooping? We will know soon enough.

Stroud reunites with Harrison

At least C.J. Stroud has brought an old friend. Houston acquired Marvin Harrison Jr. from Arizona on Monday, reuniting two former Ohio State Buckeyes at Wembley. C.J. and Marvin, back together in London, sounds less like a divisional football game and more like a benefit concert. Harrison has only five catches for 85 yards and a touchdown in four games this season, but placing him opposite Nico Collins immediately gives Jacksonville another problem. How much of the playbook he can absorb in six days is the less romantic part of the reunion tour.

Stroud is the central problem. He has thrown for 1,402 yards and six touchdowns without an interception in 185 attempts. Jacksonville has six interceptions and allows only 14 points per game, yet ranks 30th against the pass at 266.2 yards per game. The contradiction is not quite as strange as it looks: opponents throw often because they cannot run, while the Jaguars rank sixth at preventing explosive plays and second in red-zone touchdown rate. They bend, take the ball away and rarely let all those passing yards turn into points.

Texans look to exploit Jacksonville’s weaknesses

Houston is built to test the soft spot. The Texans use three-receiver personnel on more than two-thirds of their snaps and protect Stroud well from those formations. Jacksonville has been at its most vulnerable against exactly that look. The question is whether Harrison can contribute immediately, and whether Houston can stay balanced without David Montgomery, who did not travel because of a groin injury. Woody Marks becomes the lead back against the NFL’s top-ranked run defense. That is not an especially warm welcome.

The matchup flips when Jacksonville has the ball. Houston has 20 sacks, second-most in the league, and Will Anderson Jr. leads the NFL with 7.5. Jaguars left tackle Anton Harrison is out with a knee injury, leaving Walker Little to protect Trevor Lawrence’s blind side. Lawrence has 10 touchdown passes against three interceptions, but the Texans do not need to dominate every snap. They need Anderson and Danielle Hunter to wreck two or three of them.

Playoff implications raise the stakes

Jacksonville has the better record and a plus-53 point differential, but Houston’s 1-4 record hides a team that has scored only two fewer points than it has allowed. The Texans finally broke through with a 26-3 win over Tennessee last week. They are also desperate. A Jacksonville win puts the Jaguars at 5-1 and Houston at 1-5, a four-game divisional gap before Halloween. Over the last decade, 38 of 40 teams starting 5-1 or better made the playoffs; only two of 46 teams starting 1-5 or worse recovered to get there.

This should be closer than the records suggest. The last five meetings have all been decided by one score, and London has produced 24 one-score games in its first 44 regular-season contests. Jacksonville has the acclimatisation edge, the stronger running game and enough defensive discipline to make Houston earn every point. The Texans have the pass rush and the quarterback to make it uncomfortable. My pick: Jaguars 20, Texans 17. Scott Kenny may disagree.

A Liverpool fan’s unlikely journey to Wembley

Kenny, a 31-year-old from Liverpool, became a Texans supporter after taking an online quiz to choose an NFL team. It gave him Houston. Unconvinced, he took a different quiz. Houston again. He wisely declined a third opinion. On Sunday he will see the Texans in person for the first time, wearing a J.J. Watt jersey from the club’s 10th-anniversary season. His father supports San Francisco; his wife chose Green Bay because she likes cheese. Kenny says getting to Wembley feels like winning the lottery and believes this is the game that turns Houston’s season around. Two quizzes have already been right once. Perhaps they know something we do not.

Where to watch and listen 

Sunday, October 18, 2026 • Wembley Stadium
Kickoff: 14:30 London / 15:30 most of continental Europe / 16:30 Finland / 09:30 ET / 06:30 PT. 

Commentary and broadcast teams 

USA and English game feed: Bob Wischusen (play-by-play) will be absent from his usual weekend gig as the Jet radio man, Louis Riddick (analyst) and Molly McGrath (sideline). The same call is carried on the principal English-language international feed. 

UK: Channel 5 carries the game free, with Bob Wischusen and Louis Riddick on the game call. Channel 5’s 2026 presentation roster is Dermot O’Leary, Sam Quek and Osi Umenyiora. Sky Sports NFL begins at 14:00; Neil Reynolds, Phoebe Schecter and Jason Bell headline Sky’s regular Sunday team. 

Germany — RTL / Sky Sport: Vivian Bahlmann presents, Frederick Schulz commentates with former NFL lineman Jakob Johnson as expert, and Marcel Klein reports from Wembley. Coverage begins at 15:00 CEST. 

Try the radio 

For a fun alternative, turn down the television and try talkSPORT 2. Will Gavin is on the call from Wembley. Listen through the talkSPORT app or website; online sports rights can vary by location.