The most important match in world club soccer will now be available to its largest American audience ever.
The 2010 UEFA Champions League final will be aired on the FOX network on Saturday, May 22 (2:30pm), making it the first time a Champions League final has aired on American broadcast television.
In past years, the final has been aired at mid-week on ESPN networks, but with the move to a broadcast network instead of cable network, and with a Saturday kickoff instead of a mid-week kickoff, the audience for the match should shatter all previous viewing records (especially in the United States).
The final is being played at Real Madrid's Estadio Bernabeu.
What do you think of this news? Planning a Champions League Final party? Looking forward the HD broadcast?
Share your thoughts below.
Spain is only 5 hours ahead of EST.
a 2:30pm EST kickoff would be 7:30pm in Spain…
I’m predicting a 10.7 TV rating.
lol I can tell
fox airs the champions league on fox soccer channel, fox soccer plus, fsn, fox sports international and espanol, and partners to air other games on direc tv and setanta (now fox soccer plus). they’ve offered the most extensive coverage of the champions league in the u.s. than ever before, so no, you’re wrong. now they’ve moved the final from cable tv FX to free national broadcast FOX. this is a massive step forward.
just sayin.
do you know how lame the american announcers are gonna be, its gonna sound like a flippin’ baseball game. NO SOUL!!!
This is awesome. I don’t get FSC and I’m glad I’ll be able to watch the final on my TV rather than hope for a decent web feed.
Fox wouldn’t do this unless they felt the final was going to yield an audience large enough to warrant changing it from FX. I wonder if some of the growing interest in WC 2010 is influencing this decision. Good news in any case.
The future is now
Having said that, do you plan on watching the CL final? (no snark, I’m curious)
I believe you are correct. The above discussion is about World Wide audience, not US.
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I’m in that category. Although, according to most of the posters on here, you can’t be Southern and like soccer.
Yup, huge move right here folks. Soccer is coming to this country. Move out of the way boring ass MLB and childish NBA
A tasty appetizer for the blowout coverage ABC/ESPN will have for the World Cup a few weeks later and more confirmation that soccer has arrived in America. But if MLS is going to transfer television viewership into attendance or better tv ratings for its games, it had better loosen the purse strings quick to allow better quality of play on the field. Otherwise, Americans will undoubtedly be content to get their soccer fix from an ever-growing number of television options showing the best games in the best leagues. But well done to Fox for making this move.
Any news on which cable networks will carry the FSC Plus channel and whether we would have to buy extra package for it?
AS long as Fox shows the game in areas that there isnt FSC I’ll be happy.
football in europe isnt boring at all.
“But events that many people assume were planetary box-office hits were, in fact, far from it. November’s so-called “clash of the Titans” match in the Premier League between Manchester United and Arsenal reported before kick-off to be a game that would draw one billion people globally actually attracted, ahem, less than one per cent of that figure. Yesterday’s report says the total world-wide in-home audience was 8m people, with a reach of 27m.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/tvs-great-viewing-mirage-768839.html
I mentioned EPL only becuase FSC has rights to that league’s games along with Serie A. If I had my drothers I would pick EPL over Eyetie games.
Games in Madrid tend to start around 9 or 10. I haven’t double-checked but it’s by no means impossible. It’s actually the norm there.
I was thinking West Coast Time….sorry…
That’s not Memorial Day weekend, actually, so it should be good.
Mem. Day is May 31st…I know because it’s my next scheduled holiday. Depressing.
I’d prefer to forget it myself.
If it is a 2:30 EST broadcast (as Ives said) IT WON’T BE LIVE from Spain where it will be well after 10 PM at night….surprised no one noticed that thus far….which takes a lot of air out of the ballon in my opinion….why not show it live?
That stinks. They should move the Sounders game up. There can’t be another place in the US where there will be more interest.
I think there is another level in there.
The casual fan when it comes to international soccer,
but big fans when it comes to US soccer.
We really don’t care who is getting relegated in some Euro league, but follow all things US. I think this overlaps with 3 a little bit, in that it really needs to be US to get constant attention, but we love soccer already…a lot.
Are we American sports fans ? Sure, can’t wait for spring trainging, loved the SuperBowl, but also have season tickets for my soccer team.
This group is the only group that will grow any time soon.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE60U0G220100131,
are we talking about viewers only in the US or globally. If we only count people in the US then the super bowl wins, but if we count it globally then CL will beat it easily. by the way the world cup has 3 times as many viewers as the super bowl. When the US starts advertising big games (futbol) just like it does for throw ball then the US numbers will keep going up.
You right. Unfortunately, the article left out that detail you just pointed out: in US history. As we all know, the Super Bowl or any other American sport does not even come close to the CL Final in terms of viewership.
Yes it is.
A November 2007 Premier League match pitting Arsenal and Man United in a battle at the top of the table was supposedly viewed by a hugely exaggerated figure of a billion people. It was probably closer to the 100-200 million range. (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/2325057/Premier-League-is-worlds-favourite-league.html)
The 2007 SB was estimated to be watched by just under 140 million globally. (http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/personal-finance/on-topic/sports/international-super-bowl-wins-loses/)
Recent CL final numbers are all over the place from 100-200 million.
The Super Bowl generates a HUGE rating in the US, but really doesn’t build upon that globally due to the game being on in the middle of the night or early morning in much of the rest of the world and the lack of global interest in American football.
A midday PL match pitting two title contenders against one another can actually get a prime time audience in East Asia and generates far more interest with the global viewing public.
FWIW, estimating global audience is fraught with difficulty and usual numbers are inflated and flat out made up.
What there was an American football game this last weekend?
A rainy day on the east coast will be a huge help for ratings- Saturday afternoon on Memorial Day weekend not the best time for casual fans to be home.
Yankees/Mets & Red Sox/Phillies on at 7 that night on Fox. – good, bad, or indifferent effect on the CL final ratings?
am I the only person who likes NASCAR & international soccer? I’m guessing we’re a pretty small demographic- people who know both Craven Cottage and Ricky Craven.
World Football is going to collapse – I hope along with it is the Chelea’s, Man United’s and Man City’s… A salary cap MUST be forced upon these idiots. This story is staggering and why football in Europe is so f’ing boring every year.
Same money, same teams.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/SPORT/football/02/10/football.finances/index.html?hpt=Sbin
…with Joe Buck and Troy Aikman doing the announcing. 🙂