Nadine Nurasyid’s incredible journey from ballet dancer to NFL football coach

American football may be a tough sport, but Nadine Nurasyid’s experience in recent months has been a very loving one. The 40-year-old football pioneer has been showered with congratulations and heart emojis on social media since it was announced that she will be joining the coaching team of the Indianapolis Colts that are playing in the top US football league NFL. “She truly deserves it!” is posted on the German Instagram channel of the NFL. Another user writes: “Keep it up, keep inspiring people. You are a rockstar.” So who is this person that so many people are fascinated by?

A late start in American football

The way in which Nadine Nurasyid got into football was rather unusual. She started out as a ballet dancer before moving on to martial arts and soccer, and it was only at the age of 27 that she started to play American football in her home town Munich. “What is a lot more noteworthy than my gender is where I am from and how I started to play football. That is the greatest difference,” the athlete with the Bavarian accent and radiant smile said in a recent interview.

Nadine Nurasyid was successful at the typical American sport from the start. She was named Rookie of the Year in her first season in Germany’s top league with the Munich Cowboys Ladies, the first of a number of awards including the MVP Defense award as most valuable defence player in the final match known as the Ladies Bowl. In 2017, Nadine Nurasyid was part of the German national team that came second in the European Flag Football Championships, the non-contact version of football.

Nadine Nurasyid’s career as a trainer started with a men’s team. In 2022 she was named Europe’s first female head coach of a first league team, the Munich Cowboys, and was presented the German Coach of the Year award in the same year. The NFL, however, is quite literally a league of its own and is the world’s football league that attracts the greatest number of spectators. An average match in Indianapolis has an audience of around 65,000 people. American football is steadily gaining popularity in Germany, and another NFL match will be held in Munich in the 2026/27 season. However, interest in Germany is largely focused on the US top league, while American football played in the German leagues continues to be a niche sport.

Strong pressure, great atmosphere

Football continues to be the most popular sport in the USA, and this is associated with strong pressure on players and trainers alike. The atmosphere in the US is not entirely new to Nadine Nurasyid, as she spent a few weeks observing the activities of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Florida in 2025. She will now be working as an assistant trainer for the defensive backs of the Indianapolis Colts for at least one season. “I feel under a lot of pressure,” she says and continues by explaining that any mistake she makes could directly impact the intensity of the defence players’ training and ultimately the dynamics of the entire team. However, she also says that she feels that Indianapolis is a good choice for her. Her contract was endorsed by the Harriet P. Irsay Fellowship for Women in Football Program that is named after the grandmother of the three women who own the Colts, Carlie Irsay-Gordon, Casey Foyt and Kalen Jackson. Women are increasingly becoming a normal part of the NFL, and Nadine Nurasyid does not think of her gender as an issue with regard to her work in Indianapolis: “There was no point at which I felt I was being reduced to my sex.”

Germans in the NFL: several talented players and one superstar

There are currently nine German players on NFL teams, but most of them are only part of the practice squads, hoping to join the matchday teams. Brandon Coleman, who has been part of the offensive line of the Washington Commanders since 2024 and Marlin Klein, who has been a tight end for the Houston Texans since mid-2026 are slightly more established players. The biggest star among German football players is clearly Amon-Ra St. Brown: the 27-year-old is among the most popular players of the Detroit Lions and was even invited to play in the Pro Bowl in 2022 and 2025, the NFL all-stars event.