It is a few minutes after confetti and fireworks burst into the skies above Santa Clara and, in a white tent outside Levi’s Stadium, emotions are ready to erupt out of Aden Durde.
The Englishman’s eyes glaze over and his voice begins to break as the Seattle Seahawks defensive coordinator ponders what he will say to his mother after masterminding one of the most brutal, punishing displays in Super Bowl history. After becoming the first overseas coach ever to lift the Lombardi Trophy.
‘I can’t wait to talk to her,’ Durde says after the Seattle Seahawks beat the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX. ‘My mum has done everything to get me here. That was her sole purpose – and she did it.’
Brenda raised him by herself in North London and she has supported him on every step of his long journey from Enfield to Santa Clara, via pitstops including the London Olympians and Scottish Claymores.
Now he is a Super Bowl champion, a history maker and before long, he will surely become the first British head coach in NFL history. So when mum wakes up across the pond, in a few hours’ time, what will his message be?
‘Thanks,’ Durde says. ‘I am trying to hold [the emotions in].’ But he can feel them rising to the surface. And no wonder. What a ride and what an astonishing climax on the coast of Northern California.
Aden Durde, the Seattle Seahawks’ defensive coordinator, celebrates Super Bowl victory
Head coach Mike Macdonald and quarterback Sam Darnold lift the Lombardi Trophy
Patriots QB Drake Maye was bullied by a brutal Seattle Seahawks defense in Santa Clara
For three quarters, the Seattle Seahawks suffocated the New England Patriots. They were less than 15 minutes away from the first shutout in Super Bowl history. In the end, Seattle ran out 29-13 winners to secure a second Lombardi Trophy, a first since the 2013 season. And, in truth, the scoreline flattered the Patriots.
Their brilliant young quarterback, Drake Maye, arrived at Levi’s Stadium hoping to emulate Tom Brady. A few hours, six punishing sacks and two interceptions later, he sat in this same white tent and broke down.
The Patriots had no answer to a ferocious Seahawks defense orchestrated by Durde and head coach Mike Macdonald. NBC announcer Cris Collingsworth called it ‘one of the most brilliant performances I have ever seen’; after the game, Macdonald said ‘AD is an absolute gamechanger for us.’
Durde’s wife, Kate, and their sons were at Levi’s Stadium. They joined him on the field after victory was secured and showed him a picture of his mother and brother watching back home.
‘Just to see my boys and see the enjoyment they get from that moment,’ Durde begins. ‘My oldest son called me in the week and said: “My bucket list was going to see the Super Bowl, and I get to see my dad in the Super Bowl.” That’s the coolest thing I’ve heard in a long time.’
The 46-year-old West Ham fan is wearing a new t-shirt that reads ‘Super Bowl LX Champions’ but Durde’s elbow still carries signs of just how far he has come.
Many of his early days as a linebacker were spent playing in Southwark Park in south east London. ‘[It was] terrible,’ he told the Daily Mail with a laugh, a few days out from Super Bowl LX.
‘The field was old astroturf with sand and in parts of it, the concrete was showing. We used to play tackle football on there. It was nuts. I have a huge scar on my elbow from it, where a chunk of flesh came out.’
Alongside Macdonald, the Englishman has built one of the NFL’s most ferocious defenses
‘I have moments where I think about how blessed I am,’ said West Ham fan Durde
The former linebacker (top right) is pictured with the Hamburg Sea Devils back in 2005
Durde returned to Southwark Park around a year ago, while en route to see one of his old teams, the London Warriors. ‘I drove past it,’ he said. ‘I showed my son. It’s still there – the posts are still up.’
He couldn’t help but smile as they passed. ‘It’s a different life,’ Durde said. ‘I used to travel for an hour and a half, two hours every Wednesday and Sunday to get there.’
All those car rides and train journeys paid off because since joining the Seahawks in February 2024, the 46-year-old has built one of the NFL’s meanest defenses. It’s known as the Dark Side and Seattle’s ‘inspired’ performances are, Macdonald said, ‘a great tribute to how AD operates and what he brings to our football team… it’s been a special journey.’
This stunning Super Bowl display was the crowning moment of two seasons in Seattle and a long internship that spanned three decades.
As a linebacker, Durde played had brief spells on the practice squads of the Kansas City Chiefs and Carolina Panthers. The majority of his playing career, however, was spent in England and Germany.
Durde began coaching the Warriors in 2011 before earning a shot Stateside. He spent time with the Dallas Cowboys before landing his first staff role with the Atlanta Falcons in 2018. The Englishman returned to Dallas in 2021 as defensive line coach before Macdonald brought him to Seattle.
But it was the Chicago Bears that first put him on the road to Santa Clara. Durde’s mother bought him a video of the 1985 Super Bowl champions. And before long?
‘Me and a kid on my road liked it and we used to play,’ Durde recalled. ‘We got a ball, we went down the park and would throw it around… then we found a team.’
His schoolmates struggled to make sense of it all. ‘They didn’t really understand,’ he continued. ‘And when we were older, I wouldn’t go out because I wanted to play football. So I didn’t drink.’
He has gone to play a pivotal role in cementing American football in the UK. For a while, Durde ran what is now the International Player Pathway, the boot camp through which hopefuls such as Louis Rees-Zammit chased their NFL dreams. And, even before this crowning moment, Durde was proof of what can be achieved.
‘It is a whirlwind,’ he told the Daily Mail. ‘I have moments where I think about how blessed I am and how amazing it is to be where I am.’
Durde was recently interviewed for the head coaching roles at both the Falcons and Cleveland Browns. On this evidence it won’t be long before someone gives him a shot.
So what has been his secret to smashing down barriers in a sport so lacking in outside influence? ‘You just have to be yourself,’ Durde told the Daily Mail. ‘If you’re not good, then you’re not going to be there… don’t try and fake it.’
Durde, pictured in October 2019, landed his first full-time NFL job with the Atlanta Falcons
His Seattle defense, known as the Dark Side, dominated the Patriots at Super Bowl LX
He now lives in Bellevue, near downtown Seattle, but Durde’s accent remains proof of where home truly lies. ‘You have to be who you are to do anything, because you have to have some principles to stand on,’ he says in the shadow of Levi’s Stadium.
‘You might say I haven’t grown up with [this] sport, but I’ve loved the sport since I was a kid.’
No wonder, then, that emotions are bubbling over. Durde’s phone was blowing up long before Super Bowl Sunday. ‘I’ve had random people text me that I met, like, four or five years ago,’ he recalls. Among his close friends and former players? TV star Vernon Kay.
‘As you go through these journeys, the people that help you get lost along the way – the people that have supported you,’ Durde says. ‘And a lot of people have sacrificed a lot for me to be sitting here, but you don’t see all the people around me that helped me get here. I’m just very grateful for them.’
Most of all, mum.
‘To come from London and be here… I don’t take any of that for granted,’ he adds. ‘I’m proud.’ When he was younger, watching the Super Bowl back home, Durde would normally fall asleep at halftime. This year, as he sat in this white tent, his night was only just beginning. There will be more parties to come in Seattle and then in Britain.
‘I have to get back to London,’ he says. ‘I’ll get this mayhem out of the way.’ Then? ‘I need to go home.’
