Football (soccer) progamming in the US

[Boogahz]

For those who watch European league matches in the US, what services and/or channels do you use? FSC's selection for the upcoming season does not thrill me much, and I am not looking to watch the USL and MLS games. What I would prefer to have access to is the bundesliga games (beyond the "radio" broadcasts on bundesliga.de). I can get occasional Barclay's Premier League games on FSC, and I believe the Spanish Premier League as well...just no German league matches

[Dakanaf]

GolTv has some bundesliga games.
http://www.goltv.tv/en_index.php

[Boogahz]

Most of the highlights there are the same as those on bundesliga.de with the GolTV imprint added unless I am missing something. I checked out the Canadian site, and there is an option to see which carriers have the channel, but I cannot seem to find anything like that for the US carriers.

[Truant]

There's a channel that's always on at The Londoner when we go. It's an English Sports channel. Nothing but EPL (and occasionally rugby or something)

Next time I go I'll make a note to remember the name of the channel.

[Boogahz]

It actually took the wikipedia entry about GolTV to find where the channel is available in the US. Dish Network and DirectTV are the only two carriers here.

Now I just need to get some info about the two satellite carriers to see which is better. GolTV has tomorrow's FCB game that I wanted to see too

[Chidoro]

That sucks. GolTV is part of a 9 or 10 channel sports package on Comcast for $5 a month. The package also includs FSC, a few regional fox college channels, NBA tv and a tennis channel. It's now all included in the triple play package I have. Both Bundesliga and La Liga are on GolTV. FSC gobbled up the Serie A from them.

I wouldn't completely discount the MLS though. It's actually a pretty good league regardless of what a euro snob might say. W/ the SSS now becoming the standard as well as having a HD broadcast w/ suspended cameras (on espn2), it's a good show. Toss in the DP guys, and you have stars for those that really follow the game. I am really enjoying the Red Bulls(I have season club seats reserved at the new stadium in 2009) with Juan Pablo Angel and Jozy Altidore who is a monster at 17 years old. If they can cherry pick players from the Argentine league players that are notoriously underpaid yet extrodinarily talented and fun to watch, it'll help a great deal.

[Boogahz]

I did not realize that it was available on Comcast. Only the satellite carriers were mentioned in what I have found so far. I really don't want to go with satellite if I do not have to though.

I was happy with seeing the EPL (yeah, so it's barclay's, sue me) games over the weekend on Fox Soccer Channel, but they rarely even give the Bundesliga any airtime during their recap shows. I think they showed the scores for the 1.BL this weekend, and they showed highlights from the Karlsruhe/1.FCN game. That was it Nothing about Klose's brace against Hansa Rostock, or Luca Toni's goal which he helped set up. *sigh*

I even tried to talk my mom into grabbing GolTv in the sports package which I would pay for and then DVR'ing games. She told me to just get my own subscription, lol. Maybe I will just call and threaten to go to DirectTV for GolTV to see what Time Warner has to say about it. In the meantime, I will have to live with what highlights I can get from http://www.bundesliga.de and http://www.fcb.tv

I couldn't get enough of the second (think it was the second) goal that Altidore had in this weekend's game. It is scary that he is only 17.


Truant, I can think of two possible channels that you may have seen, Setanta Sports is the more likely of the two if you saw Rugby as well. Fox Soccer Channel actually has a lot of the EPL games as well.

[Boogahz]

I am loving my selection now with Uverse and the U400 package. I have three channels in a row for games. Fox Soccer Channel, Fox Sports en Espanol (which is almost all football too), and GolTV (YAY!). I got it installed last week, so I got to see the second half of the Bundesliga season start with Bayern beating Hansa Rostock (barely!). I am really looking forward to Sunday's game with Bayern and Werder Bremen as well. I expect it to be nasty as Bayern walloped them 4-0 last time, and with Borowski's upcoming transfer to Bayern, it should be fun.

[Boogahz]

Fox plans to start second soccer network
Tuesday, Jan 12, 2010 7:00 AM ET
[TELEVISION WATCH] Fox Sports International plans to soon launch a second soccer network, Fox Soccer Plus, drawing content from rights to events it has up until now sublicensed to Setanta Sports USA.

The announcement of the network, which will air games in the UEFA Champions League, English Premier League and Italy's Serie A, was made on Tuesday.

Fox Sports International will have to negotiate with cable and satellite providers for access. Fox Soccer Plus will be a premium service.

Fox launched its first soccer channel, now called Fox Soccer Channel, in 1997.

Last week, many listings of English Premier League matches and promotional ads for Champions League coverage were dropped from the broadcast schedules on Setanta Sports North America's Web site amid speculation Setanta may be taken over by Fox Sports International or discontinued.

Setanta also lost an EPL property last year to ESPN, which airs early Saturday games and Monday matches that had been telecast by Setanta in past years.

[Bubba Grizz]

Damn, when you said programming I thought you meant "brain washing" of our children to play soccer.

Actually I have my daughter playing soccer.

[Tyek]

My daughters All Star team just won the Sectional Championship! We have the Regional Tourney on the 30th.