The USMNT didn't have an international friendly this weekend, unfortunately. Their next game is October 9 at Soldier Field in Chicago against Poland. However, this week has seen another big event for US Soccer, as FIFA delegates made their rounds around the US to a handful of stadiums and other proposed venues for USSF's World Cup bids. I didn't realize the vote was coming up so soon-- apparently it's December 2. Today's September 9. That's not too long a wait.
Apparently Obama didn't meet the delegates in person when they visited the White House. Instead, some of his "delegates" did it. I can't believe he skived off. America will never let him get away with this.
During the World Cup, I wrote that ESPN.com had made the "Soccer" link on its main page direct you straight to its World Cup page. Since the World Cup, it now directs you straight to "Soccernet US." To go along with this change, it has remixed the type of material it includes in "Soccernet US;" in the past, it was totally MLS and US Soccer-related, and there wasn't much material turnover. Now, it seems as though ESPN has loaded the page with global news that it thinks enterprising fans in this country might find interesting. For example, it includes controversial English news such as that related to Wayne Rooney at present, as well as anything it can come up with that insults France, or that reminds us of France's World Cup debacle. I'm not sure exactly how this "Soccernet US" evolution reflects the state of soccer in this country, but it's at least indicative that the attention is changing, for sure.
Barcelona won and Real Madrid drew in La Liga matchday one. Good.
Champions League starts in less than a week. Good.
America's game starts tonight (not to be confused with America's pasttime, which did not start tonight). It started an hour ago, in fact. Brett Favre is playing. He wears Wrangler jeans. For some reason I entered a fantasy football league this year with a $50 buy-in. I haven't played for the past three seasons. Wish me luck if it's in you.
-John
Showing posts with label ESPN. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ESPN. Show all posts
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Monday, July 5, 2010
MLS Game Of The Week
There were two really good games last night. At 9 o'clock eastern, I watched Colorado draw NYRB 1-1. By the end of that game, the ESPN2 Game Of The Week was about 20 minutes in, and I watched the Galaxy beat the Sounders 3-1 in the remainder of that one.
When I watch non-Revolution MLS games, I tend to ask myself why we can't have such a quality team here in New England as the ones I'm watching. Yesterday was no different. All four of these teams were noticeably better than the Revs, and deservedly have better records as a result.
When 10:30 rolled around, I had to make a decision about whether to finish watching Colorado-NY or to watch LA-Seattle from the start. I chose to finish Colorado-NY because it had been such a great game, and I didn't expect LA-Seattle to quite measure up to it. Omar Cummings stood out-- not only for his goal, but for creating a handful of exciting scoring chances and half-chances. Not only that, but the two teams generally passed the ball exceptionally well. Colorado were clearly the better team, but NY were decent too. It was just a great game to watch.
Having said that, ESPN got it right when choosing the Game Of The Week. This was the game they advertised during World Cup quarterfinal games, hoping to hook in a few casual soccer fans to try watching an MLS game. The fact that it was Donovan's return was reason enough to show this game over the Colorado-NY game. Casual American fans who've watched this World Cup, but hadn't watched a soccer game previously since the last World Cup, have no idea who Omar Cummings is. Or Conor Casey. Or Juan Pablo Angel. Landon Donovan is the guy they'll tune in for.
About the actual game, it was almost as exciting as the first one. The main reason it didn't quite live up is that it was definitely more one-sided. The LA defense had one lapse that led to the goal-- which Steve Zakuani took very well-- and Seattle had a few half-chances and counterattacks late in the game; LA bossed the game otherwise. That said, casual viewers would not be let down by the quality of the game; the passing was great, there were great goals, teams attacked, there was no diving or injury-faking. It had everything I expected from a top-level MLS game. Plus, they got to keep the camera on Donovan when the ball was out of play, and talk about him when there was nothing else to talk about.
It was a great pair of games, and MLS's Game Of the Week turned out to be a very good advertisement for the league. I hope people actually watched it.
-John
When I watch non-Revolution MLS games, I tend to ask myself why we can't have such a quality team here in New England as the ones I'm watching. Yesterday was no different. All four of these teams were noticeably better than the Revs, and deservedly have better records as a result.
When 10:30 rolled around, I had to make a decision about whether to finish watching Colorado-NY or to watch LA-Seattle from the start. I chose to finish Colorado-NY because it had been such a great game, and I didn't expect LA-Seattle to quite measure up to it. Omar Cummings stood out-- not only for his goal, but for creating a handful of exciting scoring chances and half-chances. Not only that, but the two teams generally passed the ball exceptionally well. Colorado were clearly the better team, but NY were decent too. It was just a great game to watch.
Having said that, ESPN got it right when choosing the Game Of The Week. This was the game they advertised during World Cup quarterfinal games, hoping to hook in a few casual soccer fans to try watching an MLS game. The fact that it was Donovan's return was reason enough to show this game over the Colorado-NY game. Casual American fans who've watched this World Cup, but hadn't watched a soccer game previously since the last World Cup, have no idea who Omar Cummings is. Or Conor Casey. Or Juan Pablo Angel. Landon Donovan is the guy they'll tune in for.
About the actual game, it was almost as exciting as the first one. The main reason it didn't quite live up is that it was definitely more one-sided. The LA defense had one lapse that led to the goal-- which Steve Zakuani took very well-- and Seattle had a few half-chances and counterattacks late in the game; LA bossed the game otherwise. That said, casual viewers would not be let down by the quality of the game; the passing was great, there were great goals, teams attacked, there was no diving or injury-faking. It had everything I expected from a top-level MLS game. Plus, they got to keep the camera on Donovan when the ball was out of play, and talk about him when there was nothing else to talk about.
It was a great pair of games, and MLS's Game Of the Week turned out to be a very good advertisement for the league. I hope people actually watched it.
-John
Friday, June 4, 2010
ESPN's World Cup promotion
This doesn't have to do with MLS directly, but ESPN seems to be making a serious investment in soccer as a sport. They had UEFA Champions League coverage for a number of years until this one, at which point they were outbid by Fox Soccer, but instead invested in the EPL and Spanish La Liga. This season there were usually two or three games available on either ESPN, ESPN2, or ESPN360/ESPN3 between the two leagues, plus a number of Carling Cup games.
Now, we're seeing a pretty huge amount of World Cup promotion. For existing soccer fans like myself, it's good and bad. The bad part is that the way it's fed to us can be annoying. ESPN has these 30-second commercials that they play pretty routinely where the guy from Gladiator briefs us in very general terms on a nation's team. Sometimes instead of that guy, it's John Harkes or Robbie Mustoe in a studio setting. They're unabashedly aimed at mainstream American sports fans who know nothing about soccer. For instance, they had one on Spain where the guy said things like, "Spain have traditionally underachieved, but they won Euro 2008. Xavi Hernandez is their midfield playmaker." It's Soccer For Dummies.
When I try to look at them objectively however, I think they're very important, in a good way. They reach out to prospective new soccer fans, some of whom will hopefully stick with the sport beyond this summer, and maybe even become MLS supporters in the future. You've got to start somewhere.
Also, there are a relatively huge number of soccer headlines on espn.com's main page. That's obviously good. And I'm not sure about this next one, but the "Soccer" link on the main page that usually brings you to the Soccernet home page now brings you to the World Cup home page. You need to click on the "Soccernet" link from there to get to its homepage. Maybe ESPN expects a spike in the number of people clicking on the "Soccer" link due to the WC, most of whom only want to know about the WC. Whatever, they know more about their traffic than I do.
Bill Simmons has also been a sort of crusader for the cause, and he's had two really good soccer-centric podcasts in the past week. He had one with Alexi Lalas a few months to a year ago too, and I'm sure he's talked soccer on more occasions than that. They're pretty good podcasts, even for diehards, and especially for soccer-and-basketball fans.
So ESPN's been pretty good to the WC. We'll see how the actual game coverage is during the tournament. It'll be interesting to hear Martin Tyler's reaction when the US beats England; he's calling that game.
-John
Now, we're seeing a pretty huge amount of World Cup promotion. For existing soccer fans like myself, it's good and bad. The bad part is that the way it's fed to us can be annoying. ESPN has these 30-second commercials that they play pretty routinely where the guy from Gladiator briefs us in very general terms on a nation's team. Sometimes instead of that guy, it's John Harkes or Robbie Mustoe in a studio setting. They're unabashedly aimed at mainstream American sports fans who know nothing about soccer. For instance, they had one on Spain where the guy said things like, "Spain have traditionally underachieved, but they won Euro 2008. Xavi Hernandez is their midfield playmaker." It's Soccer For Dummies.
When I try to look at them objectively however, I think they're very important, in a good way. They reach out to prospective new soccer fans, some of whom will hopefully stick with the sport beyond this summer, and maybe even become MLS supporters in the future. You've got to start somewhere.
Also, there are a relatively huge number of soccer headlines on espn.com's main page. That's obviously good. And I'm not sure about this next one, but the "Soccer" link on the main page that usually brings you to the Soccernet home page now brings you to the World Cup home page. You need to click on the "Soccernet" link from there to get to its homepage. Maybe ESPN expects a spike in the number of people clicking on the "Soccer" link due to the WC, most of whom only want to know about the WC. Whatever, they know more about their traffic than I do.
Bill Simmons has also been a sort of crusader for the cause, and he's had two really good soccer-centric podcasts in the past week. He had one with Alexi Lalas a few months to a year ago too, and I'm sure he's talked soccer on more occasions than that. They're pretty good podcasts, even for diehards, and especially for soccer-and-basketball fans.
So ESPN's been pretty good to the WC. We'll see how the actual game coverage is during the tournament. It'll be interesting to hear Martin Tyler's reaction when the US beats England; he's calling that game.
-John
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