I am brand new to watching soccer on TV. However, I am COMPLETELY confused on the viewing options available. For example, if I want to watch basketball, then I either tune in to the NBA or the NCAA. Judging from this board, there are about a million clubs, leagues, and national teams to watch. Perhaps these seem like "ugly american" observations, but I would really appreciate it if someone could suggest a good starting focal point for watching world-class soccer. Thanks, BB
Wedgewod, You're going to be limited to what you can find in your area. MLS broadcasts should be relatively easy to find. I live in Texas, and Fox Sports Southwest showed one match a week (taped) from the F.A. Premier League in England. It usu. aired on Tuesdays. Other than that, if you get Fox Sports World you can catch matches, just look for listings. If you speak Spanish, you can watch Telemundo or other Spanish-language stations to see matches. Digital cable might give you some other options, too.
Go to soccer.com and there's a search engine for soccer programming in your area for the next week. I find that very helpful. To make things simpler for you, the European club season (August - May) is ending so you can concentrate on your domestic league, Major League Soccer. Just tune into ESPN2 every Saturday at 4 pm. There is one big match left on ESPN2 though, the European Champion's League final on May 28 between AC Milan vs Real Madrid or Juventus. Champion's League is considered the premier club tournament in the world because only the top teams from various European leagues play. There are national team matches that come on less regularly, but you can keep your eye out on BigSoccer and you'll hear about them. There's one tournament USA will be involved in this summer, the Confederations Cup in France, beginning on June 28. It's not nearly as big as the World Cup, but it pits the champion from each continent and USA will be the representative for North/Central America. Unfortunately, there is no English language TV coverage of the Confederations Cup but you can still catch it in Spanish on Galavision. Again, keep your eye out here or at soccer.com for exact dates and times. Hope this helps.
its almost summer so for now its mostly MLS (on espn2 saturday afternoons and foxsportsworld on saturday evenings), argentinian and brazilian futbol (on foxsportsworld) WUSA (PAX-TV usually) and US mens and womens friendlies (espn2 usually) - this fall is also the womens world cup best place to start: may 28th champions' league final espn2 (probably 2:30 EST) come september id make sure you have foxsportsworld for english premier league (my favorite to watch), german bundesliga (which i feel a lot of BS posters underrate) and scottish premier league (or the weekly celtic or rangers match) + uefa cup (a european tournament)
you can start by watching the UEFA cup final on 5/21/03 on Foxsport world (Celtic vs Porto) and the Champions league finals on 5/28/03 on ESPN 2 (AC Milan vs Real Madrid or Juventus)
Check out www.soccertv.com for listings on what games will be shown on TV. If you want to watch soccer on a regular basis, and don't want to be limited to MLS games on Saturdays, Fox Sports World offers a good cross-section of some of the better leagues around the world. Also, if you don't mind Spanish language broadcasts, Fox Sports en Espanol is even better. Many cable systems carry RAI(International Channel), that carries an Italian league game every Sunday, but the season is ending, so I don't know if they will have anything during the summer.