Simon Zebo hosts NFL star at training in Paris

Racing 92 and former Ireland international Simon Zebo’s pre-season training started with a bang this week as he bizarrely managed to host a training session for NFL American football star Antonio Brown.

The 31-year-old Oakland Raiders wide receiver sent out a message on Twitter looking for somewhere to train in Paris and Zebo swiftly replied, inviting him to Racing’s training ground. 

Zebo, who moved to France last summer after honing his reputation at Munster, then set up a midnight practice session for Brown, even challenging him to a “one on one” contest at the Parisian club’s Le Plessis Robinson training complex.

The former Pittsburgh Steelers player, who is described as the highest-paid receiver in the NFL since his March 2019 switch to Oakland, can be seen in a video doing a number of drills, largely based on speed and agility, but with a rugby ball. 

Unfortunately, we do not see the two players go head-to-head at any point to test which one has the better feet. Zebo, the 35-cap former Ireland flier, even signed a shirt for Brown after this strange encounter. 

Racing’s pre-season only started this week, so it will still be a few weeks before we see if anything rubbed off on the winger from this training session with NFL royalty. 

It was March when the Steelers agreed to trade Brown to the Raiders in exchange for a third and a fifth-round selection in the 2019 NFL draft. That deal became official on March 13. 

Brown followed up his midnight visit to Racing 92 by visiting PSG's football ground at Parc des Princes on Wednesday to celebrate his 31st birthday ahead of his return for a first season in California where the Raiders' pre-season preparations will be filmed by the Hard Knocks series.

WATCH: The interview Simon Zebo did on RugbyPass with Jim Hamilton