The NFL will this week celebrate their Thanksgiving games in what is set to be a tantilising and invigorating day of action.

Whether you celebrate it on the United States mainland, whether you’re an ex-pat who takes the tradition with you abroad, or if you’re not even American and just want to celebrate a day of football (that’s the pigskin kind, although we are aware that depending on your timezone, you can have a day full of football with the World Cup right now), there is something for everyone on Thanksgiving Thursday.

For us, we fall into the latter category, and although it sounds a little bit cliche, we certainly are thankful to be able to sit down on Thursday night after work, turn over to Sky Sports and watch the Detroit Lions host the Buffalo Bills, followed by the Dallas Cowboys welcoming the New York Giants before rounding off with the Minnesota Vikings taking on the New England Patriots

But just what does playing on Thanksgiving mean to the players? What are their routines for the big day? And just why has Thanksgiving football become such a big part of the NFL calendar? What better person to ask than former Super Bowl champion Osi Umenyiora, who played on Thanksgiving in 2009 when his New York Giants took on the Denver Broncos and who is now part of the NFL UK scene on your TVs as an analyst.

He recently sat down with a number of members of the U.K media to answer those questions and more ahead of the games on Thanksgiving, and he started off by explaining what it means to play on such a special occasion:

I think at that particular time, you knew everybody was going to be watching. So as a player it kind of elevated everything to a different level. A lot of people wanted to be at home with their families, Thanksgiving is a very special occasion, I would say for a lot of American people. But you also knew you had the opportunity to entertain people, give them some joy in whatever they were doing, giving them some entertainment, so it was also a very special occasion as a player.

As mentioned above, Umenyiora played only the one Thanksgiving game, and was sadly on the receiving end of a 26-6 loss to the Broncos, and whilst he understands how special it is, he didn’t feel the warmth towards the day as others might, as he explained he’d rather be at home watching than strapping on the shoulder pads: 

I played in one Thanksgiving game, so I can I can't say that it meant any more to be completely honest with you. You would much rather not be playing on Thanksgiving because Thanksgiving is when you really want to spend a lot of time with your family, it's a really special holiday. But the fact that everybody's going to be watching might make it a little bit more special, but I just personally didn't feel that way when I was playing on Thanksgiving. The playoffs were completely different, I think the Super Bowl is another thing, but Thanksgiving is just another game being played on a day where I'd rather be eating.

Here in the U.K, there have often been debates about whether or not we should go back to the tradition of playing Premier League games on Christmas day again like we did years ago (something that the NFL also isn’t averse too, as they’ve got three games scheduled this year), but as Umenyiora further explained, there’s a specific reason why the NFL has embraced playing on holidays, and gave a pretty big hint why the United Kingdom might be some way off doing the same:  

I think in terms of every team looking forward to it, I think they look forward to it in terms of the marketing department because of the visibility. You know that everybody's going to be home, it’s a time when everybody's going to be gathered around the TV. So as a team, if you play on Thanksgiving you know you're going to get all the eyeballs you know everybody's going to be watching. So I think that's why you would say that it's special. NFL is by far the biggest game in America, and Thanksgiving usually happens right during the peak part of the season, and you're getting to see some good teams playing against each other for everybody to see. 

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Osi Umenyiora of the New York Giants (Photo by Jim McIsaac/Getty Images)

So that's why I would say that it's special. And it would be the same thing in the United Kingdom on Christmas Day. Everybody's going to be home, everyone’s going to be spending time with family. So if you're a fan of whatever team it is, if that team is playing, you're going to sit there and everybody's going to be watching these particular games. So it would be a boom in terms of revenue, in terms of the amount of money that you're you're able to make. But you know, America is a lot more capitalistic than the United Kingdom so you’re going to have pushback on things like that.

And finally the important stuff, with the games taking place right in the middle of the season, players have to be very careful about how they partake in the food side of Thanksgiving if they are lucky enough not to be playing, and as Umenyiora puts it, staying in shape isn’t necessarily a barrier to enjoying the feast at the dinner table, but you do have to be careful with how you handle it. 

I would say that as a player, you would prepare yourself for that day. Usually you have to weigh in on Friday, this is when if you're overweight or underweight, they would fine you. And so if you knew that Thursday was going to be like a really big day for you in terms of eating then Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, you basically just couldn't eat, like you're just not going to eat anything, so you can have enough room for what's going take place on Thursday, so that would be the only routine. As a defensive lineman I liked to be light, so I liked to have my weight at a certain place when I was playing, even though I was a lot bigger than I am now. I still needed to consume a certain amount of food. And so I knew Thursday was going to be a very, very massive day. So I wouldn't eat for like two days prior to that to be able to gorge myself.

You can watch all of the NFL Thanksgiving Action on Sky Sports with coverage beginning on Sky Sports Main Event at 5pm