The practice of flag football in Portugal has seen “quite rapid growth”, in teams and practitioners, in anticipation of its debut in the Olympic program, in Los Angeles’ 2028, with the federation awaiting public utility status.
In an interview with Lusa, when today the four-way final of the main national championship in this aspect of American football is being played, without physical contact, the president of the Portuguese American Football Federation (FPFA) notes the moment of expansion that is being experienced.
“We have great expectations for this final four, especially because we have witnessed a very rapid growth in the number of flag football teams and players in Portugal. Four years ago, we had three teams competing, and this year there are 21. Taking into account that our federation does not yet have public utility status, doing this with almost no resources is, for us, a great victory as a federation”, explains Pedro Esteves.
With more than 10 clubs created across the country, without being concentrated “just in Lisbon or Porto”, there is “great expectation” about this aspect, which already has a sponsor for the League and even for other projects, such as the participation of the Portuguese team in the European Championship, in September last year, a “magnificent experience” that Esteves believes can “boost the sport”.
“The growth, the ‘buzz’, is growing, also combined with the fact that flag football will have its debut at the Olympic Games, in Los Angeles ‘2028. For a ‘flag football’ player, it ends up being much more than competing in a Portuguese League, there is a concrete target”, explains the director.
According to Pedro Esteves, Portugal will not be at the next world championship, in 2027 in Germany, but can still try to qualify for the Olympics via that year’s European Championships, which Portugal has applied to host.
Elected in July 2024, he has been fighting to obtain public utility status for the FPFA, so that he can later obtain public sports utility status, but everything has been a “relatively bureaucratic” process and has involved a lot of “homework” to draw up documents and detail them.
The request was submitted to CEJURE in July 2025, followed by further clarifications last November, with the process having already received “several positive opinions” that leave the leader optimistic.
“We can only wait. It’s a process that we don’t know how long it will take. (…) It’s a race against time to provide better conditions for the athletes, having to prepare ourselves so that in 2027 we can have an even stronger team, with better conditions and better prepared”, he comments.
Even so, he says he believes that this first process, and then the request to obtain the status of public sports utility, which allows access to financing and entails other legal requirements, could happen this year.
As for the final four, which will be played today at the Estádio Mário Wilson, in Oeiras, Pedro Esteves expects “a day of celebration”, with the Salgueiros Hammers, the Braga Black Knights, the Spanish Pontevedra Canteiros and the Lisboa Devils, in this case the current two-time American football champions looking to make their debut in flag football, in contention.
