American football is coming to Australia - can it succeed? Image source, Supplied: San Francisco 49ers Image caption, George Kittle of the San Francisco 49ers and other players were greeted by fans in Melbourne this week By Simon Atkinson Australia producer An oval ball, in September, in Melbourne usually means just one thing - the business end of the Australian rules football (AFL) season. But on Friday, at the unsportingly early time of 7am, 100,000 people will begin filing into the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) for a very un-Australian sporting spectacle - American football. The LA Rams take on the San Francisco 49ers in their opening National Football League (NFL) fixture, the first time the country has hosted a meaningful, non-exhibition regular season game. The match sold out months ago, with more than half the crowd expected to be people living outside the state of Victoria. On the official ticket resale site, a restricted view seat is priced at more than A$650 (£350/US$470)."Walking down the street, it's AFL finals week and you wouldn't even know," says Thomas Mc Millan, host of the NFL podcast Any Given Sunday Australia."It's all NFL everywhere. There are bars that are nothing but 49ers bars or Rams bars. We have a Ram Tram getting around the district. When you're in Melbourne and AFL isn't visible, it shows how big this is at the moment."Kickoff at 10.35am local time on Friday may not be typical for local fans, but meets the demands of prime time US television schedules and their advertisers. The league held its first international match in 2007, and over the past two decades the overseas matches have become a long-term strategy to attract supporters and their dollars. Nine games outside the US are scheduled for the upcoming season, including three in London. But Melbourne is the furthest that players and US-based fans will have to travel. Image source, Supplied: LA Rams Image caption, Fans admire an LA Rams mural in a Melbourne laneway"Obviously there are question marks when you hear you are playing in Australia," 49ers running back Christian Mc Caffrey told a press conference this week."But it has been so cool… the food's incredible, the coffee's great."That caffeine reference was perhaps as much to the time zone, as nod to the city's famous café culture. Melbourne is a mind-warping 17 hours ahead of California where both teams are based, and much of the pre-match attention has been on the two teams and their contrasting approaches to trying to "beat" the jet lag. For the 49ers, who arrived late last week, their players have had time to get over the long journey, adjust to the time zone, acclimatise and practice at a nearby stadium. Controversially, the LA Rams are taking things to the other extreme, planning to arrive on Thursday morning local time on a charted Qantas A380 superjumbo, play on Friday, and get back to the US west coast shortly afterwards, in theory to prepare for their next match with minimum disruption to the player's body clocks."Definitely it's a gamble," says Mc Millan. "If they don't quite get things right after the 16-hour flight, you still might have that jet lag, even though you're trying to avoid it."

"And not everyone can sleep on planes," says his co-host Danny Webb. "Whether you're in first class, business class, whatever it is, you're still on a plane."

"And", adds Mc Millan: "And they're six foot six most of them, so it's going to be even tighter seats".Despite it technically being a "home" game for the Rams, who bid for NFL marketing rights in Australia under the leagues Global Markets programme, this all means it is the San Francisco 49ers that have more of a presence around Melbourne this week. Image source, Supplied: San Francisco 49ers Image caption, Former NFL players Joe Nedney (left) and Jesse Sapolu attend a "sausage sizzle"And while most practice sessions have been behind closed doors, there have been player appearances at a rally for fans and an AFL match, while ex-stars turn...