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Amon-Ra St. Brown after his touchdown

Photo: Ed Zurga / dpa

Defending champion Kansas City Chiefs around star quarterback Patrick Mahomes surprisingly lost at home to the Detroit Lions at the start of the NFL season. At 21:20 for the guests, Amon-Ra St. Brown scored the first touchdown of the season and took the lead. The 23-year-old has now scored twelve NFL touchdowns in his career and extended the German record. With six catches of passes, he also had the highest number of passes in the football game and recorded a total of 71 yards.

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"It was fun. At the end of the day, we played together as a team, which counted the most," St. Brown said. In the past, it was often difficult for the Lions to win close encounters. "Now we go into the games feeling we can't lose," he said, adding: "Even if we're behind, we feel like we can come back."

The defense is also convincing

The Chiefs turned the game around before the break and went into halftime with a 14-7 lead. After the change of sides, however, the Super Bowl champion's offense, which had to do without the injured Travis Kelce, only managed two field goals. The Lions, on the other hand, intercepted a pass from Mahomes, scored a touchdown from the situation and took the lead for the second time a good seven minutes before the end of the game – which the team from Detroit defended until the end.

"We played hard the whole game. We didn't play our best, but we're made for it," Lions quarterback Jared Goff said.

With eight wins in the last ten games of last season, the Lions had caused great euphoria and made themselves so interesting that the NFL wanted to have the team, which had been notoriously weak for decades, at the prestigious season opener.

How serious the Lions were about not only having traveled to Kansas City to shake hands was shown in the first quarter when the score was 0-0: Instead of kicking the ball far in the direction of the Chiefs deep in their own half as usual on the fourth attempt, the Lions only pretended, surprised the host and kept the attack alive. The result a few minutes later: St. Brown's touchdown.

Amon-Ra St. Brown has an American father and a German mother. He used to spend his summer holidays regularly in Leverkusen. His brother, Equanimeous St. Brown, also plays in the NFL for the Chicago Bears.

kjo/dpa