A field goal is worth 3 points, and it happens when a team kicks the ball through the tall yellow goalposts at the back of the end zone. You’ll usually see it on fourth down, when a team is close enough to kick but too far to reasonably go for a first down or a touchdown and it’s the “take the points” option instead of risking giving the ball away with nothing.
Forward progress is the spot where a ball carrier’s forward momentum was stopped by the defense and that’s where the ball gets placed for the next play, even if the runner gets pushed backward after that. Once a defender stops you moving forward, the play is effectively over at the furthest point you reached.
The rule is simpler than it looks: if the ball carrier is tackled in bounds, the clock keeps running. If the play can’t continue with an incomplete pass, a runner stepping out of bounds, a score then the clock stops. The catch most fans miss: for most of the game, stepping out of bounds only pauses the clock until the referee spots the ball for the next play. It only stays stopped until the snap late in the half and late in the game, which is why the sideline becomes the most valuable real estate in football at the end.
The two-minute warning is an automatic timeout that happens when the game clock reaches 2:00 in each half — late in the 2nd quarter and late in the 4th. Nobody calls it and nobody has to spend one of their timeouts: the officials just stop the game, both teams get a free breather, and from that moment the endgame runs on different math.
The NFL plays games in London to grow the sport internationally, new fans, new TV markets, new revenue. It started with one game at Wembley Stadium in 2007 and worked so well the league kept adding more. In 2026 there are a record nine international games across seven countries, including three in London.
When a penalty is called, the team it helps gets a choice: accept it or decline it. They decline when the result of the play was actually better than what the penalty would give them. If your team just gained 30 yards on a play and the defense was called for holding, why take the 10-yard penalty and replay the down? Keep the 30 yards. Declining is just taking the better deal.
The red zone is the final 20 yards before the end zone. Offenses score touchdowns far more often from inside the 20, so every trip there feels like points are coming and kicking a field goal from the red zone feels like a letdown. It’s where games are won and lost.
The offense gets four chances, called downs, to move the ball 10 yards. If they make it, they get four fresh chances. If they don’t, the other team takes the ball. That’s the entire engine of football everything else is built on top of those four chances.
