A couple months ago when the news broke that ESPN lost the UEFA Champions League rights to Fox, most of the responses I read here and elsewhere were negative and somewhere along the lines of, "there's no HD and Max Bretos sucks."
This was surprising.
I figured the less Tommy Symth in your life -- the better.
Of course, as always, what do I know?
Tuesday afternoon I made sure to be tuned in at 2 p.m. for Fox Soccer Channel's first crack at the most prestigious club competition in the world. It was worth checking out how FSC would handle it.
Would the typical cable-access level production, not to mention 'Wayne's World' feel, of the network sully the good name of the Champions League?
Would, on cue, the first time the UEFA Anthem was supposed to be played would it cut away to a cheaply produced ad for an online flea market?
Through the first Match Day (Tuesday's final stage of qualifying), at least, so far so good.
First off, it's hard to screw up anything when Bobby McMahon is involved. Even as he's shed his glasses and tried to get a more polished television persona, the Scot remains an absolute encyclopedia of soccer knowledge. He doesn't bring schtick, just honest information and opinion, which seems rather rare in television sports analysts. McMahon isn't beholden to any players or teams, which is part of what makes his insight great. He looks at the games like a banker (his day job) and we're all better for it.
Warren Barton? Eh. Inimitably forgettable.
Hell, even Bretos kept himself in check and even admitted he knew nothing about Moldovian soccer instead of cooking up some bad metaphor. (Okay, at the end of the game on FSC he couldn't resist saying there's, "a new sheriff in town.")
Here's the biggest upside for Fox acquiring the Champions League rights. It's not Fox Soccer, it's Fox Sports in general.
Tuesday afternoon on my cable system there were three, yes, three live matchups airing all at once. Arsenal/Celtic was on MSG+, FC Sheriff/Olympiacos on FSC and Stuttgart/God Only Knows How to Produce Cypriot FC on Fox Sports Espanol. Allegedly Setanta had Sporting/Fiorentina, too, but it wasn't on broadband. (Hey, Setanta-i, thanks for cutting off at halftime of Sunderland/Chelsea mysteriously. Was there an MLB blackout that needed to be enforced?)
On the plus side, too, the Arsenal/Celtic match was in HD, or at least upscaled 480p resolution. It wasn't nearly as sharp as Cheslea/Hull City Sunday on ESPN2, but better than your usual FSC telecast, widescreen to boot.
As for the broadcasts themselves? Fox stuck with the English/British announcing feeds and the standard UEFA graphics. The Arsenal/Celtic match went about 15 minutes before the actual announcing feed was picked up, so yes, there was a hiccup.
So overall, so long as Fox continues to spread the Champions League across all its platforms, we the viewers look to be clear winners as there won't be anymore waiting for ESPN to re-play at match on ESPN Classic after the fact.
Once FSC goes HD in February, all bets are off.
As for Arsenal/Celtic. Impressive win by Arsenal to walk away from Parkhead with a 2-0 lead going back to the Emirates.
The Gunners weren't as pacey or tricksy as the weekend at Goodison Park, but they got a result. Yes, the first goal just before the half was about as fluky a deflection as you'll ever see -- William Gallas was diving to get out of the way and it went off his back -- but it was a result on the road against a team on par with the Premier League midtablers. (The second Arsenal goal was a Celtic own-goal.)
As the match progressed, it made me wonder, who would have thought during that whole Ashely Cole-to-Chelsea imbroglio a couple years ago, that Arsenal might have gotten the better of the deal with Gallas moving to the Emirates. Yes, the Frenchman had his famous pouting incident, but that's in the past. With a couple of the Arsenal big personalities -- namely Emmanuel Adebayor -- out the door, Gallas' personality quirks might not be such an issue. He still remains the club's best defensive minded player, even if he (like everyone at the Emirates) likes to go forward into the attack.
What is an issue, should anything happen to Gallas or the newest Gunner import Thomas Vermaelen, then Arsenal is severely boned. (Assuming Arsene Wenger can't pry Breda Hangeland away from Fulham in the next 12 days.) We all saw how the Keiran Gibbs scenario worked out last season.
Arsenal can score a ton of goals, but still need to keep some out. That central defense is looking razor thin at the moment.
For Celtic this is a stinging defeat since the Bhoys are all but Europa League bound. For most of the first half they more than held their own against the Young Gunners. Celtic passed and possessed, but had no finishing touch in the final third. Guess that's what happens when you have Georgios Samaras as your lone striker.
And on top of that, it's why you don't blow a seven-point lead to Rangers in the Scottish Premier League. (How Arsenal and Celtic drew together in light of the other playoff games seems very, very fishy, no?)
It was only one day, but so far the Champions League moving to Fox doesn't seem like such an issue. In fact, it was downright pleasurable.
This overall shifting paradigm of soccer on television in the U.S. is reminiscent of what happened in the early 1990s when Fox threw its hat into the NFL broadcasting ring acquiring the rights to the NFC, which caused a major carousel to spin around the dial. Everyone figured it would be chaotic and Fox would ruin the NFL. A decade or so later, it's hardly an issue, so long as you like robots morphing out from the scoreboard graphics.
In a couple weeks, maybe, we'll have this soccer situation all figured out.
One thing's for certain, there's an absolute metric ton of soccer on television these days. Who'd have thunk it?
This was surprising.
I figured the less Tommy Symth in your life -- the better.
Of course, as always, what do I know?
Tuesday afternoon I made sure to be tuned in at 2 p.m. for Fox Soccer Channel's first crack at the most prestigious club competition in the world. It was worth checking out how FSC would handle it.
Would the typical cable-access level production, not to mention 'Wayne's World' feel, of the network sully the good name of the Champions League?
Would, on cue, the first time the UEFA Anthem was supposed to be played would it cut away to a cheaply produced ad for an online flea market?
Through the first Match Day (Tuesday's final stage of qualifying), at least, so far so good.
First off, it's hard to screw up anything when Bobby McMahon is involved. Even as he's shed his glasses and tried to get a more polished television persona, the Scot remains an absolute encyclopedia of soccer knowledge. He doesn't bring schtick, just honest information and opinion, which seems rather rare in television sports analysts. McMahon isn't beholden to any players or teams, which is part of what makes his insight great. He looks at the games like a banker (his day job) and we're all better for it.
Warren Barton? Eh. Inimitably forgettable.
Hell, even Bretos kept himself in check and even admitted he knew nothing about Moldovian soccer instead of cooking up some bad metaphor. (Okay, at the end of the game on FSC he couldn't resist saying there's, "a new sheriff in town.")
Here's the biggest upside for Fox acquiring the Champions League rights. It's not Fox Soccer, it's Fox Sports in general.
Tuesday afternoon on my cable system there were three, yes, three live matchups airing all at once. Arsenal/Celtic was on MSG+, FC Sheriff/Olympiacos on FSC and Stuttgart/God Only Knows How to Produce Cypriot FC on Fox Sports Espanol. Allegedly Setanta had Sporting/Fiorentina, too, but it wasn't on broadband. (Hey, Setanta-i, thanks for cutting off at halftime of Sunderland/Chelsea mysteriously. Was there an MLB blackout that needed to be enforced?)
On the plus side, too, the Arsenal/Celtic match was in HD, or at least upscaled 480p resolution. It wasn't nearly as sharp as Cheslea/Hull City Sunday on ESPN2, but better than your usual FSC telecast, widescreen to boot.
As for the broadcasts themselves? Fox stuck with the English/British announcing feeds and the standard UEFA graphics. The Arsenal/Celtic match went about 15 minutes before the actual announcing feed was picked up, so yes, there was a hiccup.
So overall, so long as Fox continues to spread the Champions League across all its platforms, we the viewers look to be clear winners as there won't be anymore waiting for ESPN to re-play at match on ESPN Classic after the fact.
Once FSC goes HD in February, all bets are off.
As for Arsenal/Celtic. Impressive win by Arsenal to walk away from Parkhead with a 2-0 lead going back to the Emirates.
The Gunners weren't as pacey or tricksy as the weekend at Goodison Park, but they got a result. Yes, the first goal just before the half was about as fluky a deflection as you'll ever see -- William Gallas was diving to get out of the way and it went off his back -- but it was a result on the road against a team on par with the Premier League midtablers. (The second Arsenal goal was a Celtic own-goal.)
As the match progressed, it made me wonder, who would have thought during that whole Ashely Cole-to-Chelsea imbroglio a couple years ago, that Arsenal might have gotten the better of the deal with Gallas moving to the Emirates. Yes, the Frenchman had his famous pouting incident, but that's in the past. With a couple of the Arsenal big personalities -- namely Emmanuel Adebayor -- out the door, Gallas' personality quirks might not be such an issue. He still remains the club's best defensive minded player, even if he (like everyone at the Emirates) likes to go forward into the attack.
What is an issue, should anything happen to Gallas or the newest Gunner import Thomas Vermaelen, then Arsenal is severely boned. (Assuming Arsene Wenger can't pry Breda Hangeland away from Fulham in the next 12 days.) We all saw how the Keiran Gibbs scenario worked out last season.
Arsenal can score a ton of goals, but still need to keep some out. That central defense is looking razor thin at the moment.
For Celtic this is a stinging defeat since the Bhoys are all but Europa League bound. For most of the first half they more than held their own against the Young Gunners. Celtic passed and possessed, but had no finishing touch in the final third. Guess that's what happens when you have Georgios Samaras as your lone striker.
And on top of that, it's why you don't blow a seven-point lead to Rangers in the Scottish Premier League. (How Arsenal and Celtic drew together in light of the other playoff games seems very, very fishy, no?)
It was only one day, but so far the Champions League moving to Fox doesn't seem like such an issue. In fact, it was downright pleasurable.
This overall shifting paradigm of soccer on television in the U.S. is reminiscent of what happened in the early 1990s when Fox threw its hat into the NFL broadcasting ring acquiring the rights to the NFC, which caused a major carousel to spin around the dial. Everyone figured it would be chaotic and Fox would ruin the NFL. A decade or so later, it's hardly an issue, so long as you like robots morphing out from the scoreboard graphics.
In a couple weeks, maybe, we'll have this soccer situation all figured out.
One thing's for certain, there's an absolute metric ton of soccer on television these days. Who'd have thunk it?
Labels: bobby mcmahon, champions league, fox soccer channel, max bretos, Soccer
I watched the Celtic/Arsenal match on my local Fox Sports Net outlet and the graphics were uefa originals but the announcers were American (it seemed to my ear).
Regarding why Celtic played Arsenal (two big teams) and PFC Levski Sofia played FK Ventspils (two small-ish teams):
Uefa changed the way this works. In the past, the teams with the better coefficients got seeded in this play-off round so they were likely to draw smaller teams and thus ease their way into the group stage. This new system is part of Platini's plan to redistribute the wealth (good thing they don't hold those Uefa town hall meetings in Tampa). But the change didn't just make all the teams un-seeded like some of the dolts on FSC have been saying, it made TWO DISTINCT groups of teams. The 'champions path' and the 'non-champions path'. This is where I got confused for a while, but I think I have it figured out. Like some '1984' Newspeak, the 'champions path' features much weaker squads than the 'non' path.
The biggest teams make it straight into the group stage (the top three in England and Spain, the top two in France, the top one in Turkey and so on). Arsenal was fourth last year so they go into the 'non-champions path' along with the third place German team and so on.
It wasn't just chance that kept Arsenal from drawing a Moldavian or Israeli team - those smaller, but 'champion' teams were in a completely separate group. Essentially, of the teams in the playoff round this week and next - any of them that you have heard of are likely 'non-champions' who came in second, third or fourth in a larger Uefa league.
Byzantine to be sure, but not a crooked draw. Here is the Uefa list of the teams on each 'path.'
An added benefit of the switch to Fox is that DirecTV had a "mix" channel showing the feeds from all of the games simultaneously. Great for a day like yesterday where I didn't really have a horse in the race and was happy to just keep an eye on events.
Hey 30f thanks for explaining that, I was wondering how it was working.