It took more than four quarters, but the Minnesota Vikings stunned the New Orleans Saints with a 26-20 wild-card play-off victory on Sunday.

Russell Wilson is understood to have become the highest-paid player in NFL history after signing a new four-year contract with the Seattle Seahawks.

Tom Brady piloted Super Bowl champions New England to the winning touchdown with 56 seconds left on Sunday as the Patriots clinched the AFC East with a gut-wrenching 27-24 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Kirk Cousins drove the Washington Redskins 70 yards and Rob Kelley's one-yard touchdown run with less than a minute remaining on the clock earned them a 17-14 win over the Seattle Seahawks.

US president Donald Trump's criticism of American football players who kneel during the national anthem has sparked a mass increase in such protests around the NFL, as about 200 players sat, knelt or raised their fists in defiance.

The Carolina Panthers bounced back to winning ways with a 30-20 NFL victory over the Arizona Cardinals at the Bank of America Stadium.

The Carolina Panthers withstood a furious second half comeback from the Seattle Seahawks last night to win 31-24 and set up a National Football Conference championship showdown against the Arizona Cardinals.

Quarterback Cam Newton threw three touchdown passes and his Carolina Panthers pummelled the Atlanta Falcons 38-0 on Sunday to earn an NFL playoff first-round bye.

Aaron Rodgers threw for two touchdowns to lead the Green Bay Packers to a 27-17 victory in an NFL grudge match against the Seattle Seahawks.

It's the day when the sporting community digs deep into its neglected imaginations, with mixed results.

The two Irishmen who claimed to have sneaked into the Super Bowl have admitted that their powers only go so far, and have paid for their flights home.

American Football: There were more questions than there were answers after one of the most enthralling Super Bowls of the modern era delivered a fourth title in just over a decade to Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots on Sunday night.

Quarterback Tom Brady made Super Bowl history as the New England Patriots toppled the defending champion Seattle Seahawks in Arizona to claim their fourth title.

If the Vegas oddsmakers are to be believed, there is no separating New England and Seattle.

The Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots could produce one of the greatest Super Bowls of all time tomorrow night but the real winner may be debated for decades given the "deflategate" scandal hanging over the game.

How much more hype from over here can you stand? says John Riordan.

The NFL and the UFC have a lot in common. Both are vaudevillian nightmares that shouldn’t work but really seem to manage just fine, says John Riordan.

NFL: Coach Pete Carroll said it was "belief in one another" that saw Seattle Seahawks complete a miracle comeback to reach the Super Bowl.

The Seattle Seahawks are going to the Super Bowl for the second time in two years after clinching a dramatic 28-22 win over the Green Bay Packers in overtime at CenturyLink Field.

The Green Bay Packers will face the Super Bowl champions, the Seattle Seahawks in the NFC title game after a thrilling weekend in the NFL play-offs.

High profile coaching casualties followed quick on the heels of the final day of the NFL’s regular season as the San Francisco 49ers and the New York Jets parted ways with their coaches yesterday.

The Green Bay Packers, Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys booked their places in the play-offs after victories on Sunday while the New England Patriots earned a first round bye for the post-season.

The Pittsburgh Steelers came on strong in the fourth quarter on Sunday night for a 42-21 NFL triumph over Cincinnati that blew open the AFC North division race.

Tom Brady sparked the New England Patriots to their seventh consecutive victory in a 34-9 rout of Detroit, while Indianapolis receiver T.Y. Hilton scored a touchdown for his newborn daughter.

US federal agents conducted surprise inspections of National Football League team doctors and trainers on Sunday as part of an ongoing probe into painkiller drug abuse, the US media reported on Sunday.

The Seattle Seahawks’ mascot caused consternation yesterday when she decided to go soaring over the crowds during their match.

If you hear an Irish rugby player in the coming year using the term ’Always Compete’ or ’Fail Fast’ or admitting to spelling words backwards when they’ve felt over-anxious, you can probably put it down to a recent conversation between Joe Schmidt and a psychologist Dr Michael Gervais.

Peyton Manning broke Brett Favre’s all-time record for touchdown passes, leading Denver to a 42-17 rout of San Francisco to cap a scintillating Sunday in the NFL.

An embattled NFL, reeling from off-field brutality issues, received more bad news with numerous injuries to key players in the second week of an already tumultuous campaign.

The new NFL season in the US is bringing with it more moral confusion than ever and it’s only the beginning of August.

A Houston furniture store owner is out an estimated $7m (€5.1m) due to the Seattle Seahawks’ win in the Super Bowl on Sunday after losing a bet with customers who made hefty purchases at his stores.

The most highly anticipated Super Bowl in recent memory somehow also managed to be the biggest disappointment.

Seattle Seahawks 43 Denver Broncos 8

The Seattle Seahawks produced one of the most dominant performances in Super Bowl history as Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos were neutralised in a 43-8 humbling.

“Jimmy; was it dead mother, blind father or blind mother, dead father?”

Musical leads faithful back to the future

New York takes all the credit, talking a big game and laying on the hottest Super Bowl bashes.

Now this is how you spell out your support for a team.

Screened in over 200 countries, Super Bowl will be lapped up by well over 100 million Americans for whom it has become as symbolic of their country as Apple Pie.

With weather forecasts firming up to suggest that Sunday’s Super Bowl XLVIII may be spared the sort of intense snowstorms which have struck the New York area twice this month, both the Denver Broncos and the Seattle Seahawks arrived to their team hotels in Jersey City on Sunday ahead of a week of scrutiny.

It’s almost impossible to recall past controversies without wondering how much the Twitter prism would have stirred things up even more.

It’s rare that the two best teams in the NFL make it through to the Super Bowl.

All eyes will be on Denver tomorrow as Peyton Manning and Tom Brady face each other for the 15th time.

The NFL play-off picture was completed on Sunday with a dramatic final series of regular season games delivering big results for the Green Bay Packers, the Philadelphia Eagles and the San Diego Chargers.