I can't see Darke ever doing MLS games. The drop from Premier League (a top 3 league easily) to MLS (outside of the top 50) is huge. I think that ESPN2 will get Champions League back when FSC's current contract is up. If that happens, I could see Darke and Derek Rae as the main commentators, working on site (or at least from studio in London).
Ian Darke is a great example for aspiring commentators. His greatest quality is his diction. I can understand him clearly regardless of the conditions (passing noise, poor reception, etc.). He anunciates, rather than merely speaking. I like to follow more soccer than I have time to sit down and watch attentively for 90 minutes, and when Darke is announcing, I know that I can follow what is happening, regardless of whether or not I happen to be looking at the screen...
I think the Average parson that will tarn on espn and watch the game will like the way Ian Darke calls the game.
Sounds to me that ESPN is in the early stages of "getting it" when it comes to footy. After a damn near flawless presentation of the World Cup, they seem to be stepping up the presentation with a great move. It's not a bad line-up when JP is your #2 pbp guy.
I'd love for Darke to be co-based in the US and UK, be the announcer for all USMNT, MLS, and anything else that he can do for the network. He was great at the WC and previous international feeds of the UCL/UEL/EPL.
The Darke news is even bigger than we thought. http://twitter.com/richarddeitsch/status/25425666160 Huge soccer news: ESPN has hired Ian Darke to be its lead voice on all soccer platforms, including US National team games. about 1 hour ago via web He's got several other tweets as well elaborating on the nature of Darke's role. http://twitter.com/richarddeitsch
Confirmed by Grant WahlRT @richarddeitsch ESPN has hired Ian Darke to be its lead voice on all soccer platforms, including USMNT, USWNT, EPL, select MLS, WC14. about an hour ago This is effin brilliant!!
I am shocked about the MLS games. I'd guess that he won't do many, maybe the All-Star Game (usually features a Premier League team anyway), MLS Cup and a couple others between June-August. I am also a bit surprised that he is doing women's national team games, I'd bet he has never called women's football before. It certainly isn't as prominent in Britain as it is here in North America. The men's national team, Premier League and 2014 World Cup had already basically been confirmed by somebody familliar with the situation a couple weeks ago.
The women thing is bigger than some realize. I never watch USWNT games, but now like myself, I believe many will tune in to the games just to hear his play-by-play as well as his perspective on women's soccer.
this is a really good move by ESPN...Darke is a class act...bet he didn't know he was auditioning during the World Cup, did he?...maybe it means ESPN will start putting some "meat" on the bones they've been throwing USA fans...
I think that espn ware so happey with the way he calld the game that they said lets make him an offer. but with all the games he will be doing i think this spells the end of jp. and if i was fox rite now i wood make jp an offer. jp is not the best at all but you cant say that he dose not no football. dont no about any body else but i plan on Watching the uswnt games when on.
Speaking of "meat on the bones" I'm currently watching the pre-game show on ESPN2 with ESPN UK graphics in a studio with Rebecca Lowe hosting and McManaman as the analyst. I wonder if this is the beginning of the Darke Experience.
Stewart Robson and Ian Darke on the call, ESPN UK graphics, no bottom line. He made a reference to it being lunch time in Manchester but the viewers' breakfast time - so this seemingly is only going to the Americas. way to step your game up, ESPN!
Yeah, this is great stuff. It's about time we get a quality pregame/half/postgame set up. This is something that has gone greatly missing for me since we lost Setanta here in the US. I have to say that this will probably help me get my ass out of bed a little earlier each weekend.
I have to give ESPN some big time credit for getting ESPN UK to produce the coverage for them. I'm not the biggest fan of Darke (I'd probably prefer a mix of commentators from the international feed), but having a studio show from the UK with a knowledgeable presenter and analysts, beats hearing Bretos and Lalas from Bristol.
Lalas wouldn't come over during the MLS off-season; he didn't last year. Beyond that, I saw NOTHING that couldn't be done in Bristol aside from the latter having limited studio availability during college football season. Neither inherently better nor worse today. We shall see how things look over time.
You mean you don't have a DVR? I have one and watching the match now. Good to see the production from the UK, but this may not be a regular thing, Bottom Line update said next Saturday's match is sunderland-man united at 9:55 ET, so that's just before kickoff. Probably get the international feed for that one, so we may see the UK-produced matches for Mondays when they have several studios in use.
No no - ESPN UK did the production SOLELY (from what I gather) for the US (and maybe Caribbean) audience. So it's not a stretch to think they couldn't do the same next week too. Unless there's some sort of resource conflict with their crews for this game (pre/and especially post game) and the evening broadcast that ESPN UK regurlarly does for broadcast in Britain. Come to think of it - there was no evening match today. As with anything ESPN we need to see the trend first to confirm, but with Darke being announced the face of footy for the US, this just seems too much of a coincidence. I must say I found it a bit offputting when he decided to tell us that Manchester was located 200 mi north of London "if you don't know." Yeesh!
Maybe its a sign of things to come, weirdly our ESPN stations has gone the other way so far this session and has not taken a single ESPN UK feed and have had everything produced out of the US, again for the Champions league next week they are listing all US based commentators and the Europa league is the same there not taking any ESPN UK produced games. Hopefully they will eventually get Ian Darke to commentate a game or two for our network
I do have a DVR but I watch a ton of matches on weekends so if I get up at like 8:15 I don't start the match from the beginning, I just pick up from that point. I think what the guy was saying was that ESPN UK does a 10:00am EST match so next week, ESPN might just use the Uk feed. For the early matches, I'm hoping they keep putting together this type of quality studio production. As for the guy who said he doesn't see what they couldn't have done in Connecticut, where do I start? Quality analysis? Professional look and feel to the production? I could go on but i think this should suffice for now.
No ESPN UK doesn't have a 10am ET match. None of those matches are broadcast live in the UK (Sky has one on tape delay). The only game that ESPN UK has next weekend is Manchester City-Newcastle United on Sunday morning. There are some weekends where ESPN UK has a Saturday 12:30pm ET game, but they never have any that would conflict with an ESPN2 broadcast.
McManaman will be at the Stadium of Light in Sunderland to call Sunderland vs Man Utd for ESPN2 US (and ESPN Caribbean) on October 2. McManaman mentioned that during the post-game studio segment with Rebecca Lowe last Saturday. == Wigan vs Wolves on October 2 at 7:30am ET will be on ESPN3.com and ESPN Deportes U.S. but will NOT be on ESPN2 U.S. or ESPN Classic U.S.