I played rugby back in college for a couple years, but hadn't seen it for 10 years until I was home sick for a couple days a few months ago and caught some on FSW. Then I found myself watching (and trying to comprehend) cricket.

Haven't watched much cricket since, but I've been hooked on rugby ever since, even going out for the local club. Was it just the fever or are there others?

Sigh.

As a huge soccer and cricket fan, I would do almost anything to get FOX Sports World. Unfortunately, the only way for me is through satellite, and my cable deal is too good (~$90/month for broadband internet and digital cable with all premium movie channels) to switch.

FSW is my jesus. It is the only place to watch quality soccer other than the bad dubbing of GolTV. Only if there weren't so many infomercials.....

Ok, so as a huge Cricket fan, maybe you can explain this... is televised Cricket the WHOLE THING, or is it like condensed down? I remember once watching a match that was saying they were losing their satellite window and would be back on several hours later.

Is that normal?

Usually, cricket matches are shown in their entirety. Since test matches generally last five days (with about eight hours of play each day), however, my guess is that a network like FSW wouldn't air them. Instead, you'd probably have to order them on pay-per-view. One-day matches are more TV-friendly I think, so my guess is that you'd see more of those on FSW.

Heh. Got into FSW over Easter. Was home on Sunday, which is rare, and the people at Videotron suddenly added a shitload of new channels (Deja View, TV Land, Mystery, etc.), and FSW was one of 'em. Spent days watching EPL football/soccer matches. Am now addicted. Glad Arsenal won the Cup but, man, I wish I had watched the game this morning. Stupid work making me come in early... Humph!

Except for the week where they lost to MUFC in the FA Cup Semis and falling to Chelsea in the return match of the Champions League Quarters, Arsenal has been brilliant this year. I was watching the Gunners-Leeds match on FSW several weeks back and Theiry Henry was just amazing. 5 goals, all of them amazing goals. It would be an outrage is he isn't named Premiership POY.

He was named the PFA Player of the Year yesterday. Thierry Henry is definitely my favorite soccer player in the world. His combination of pace, dribbling, and finishing is a beautiful sight to behold.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see if Arsenal can finish the year unbeaten in the Premiership. Their last four fixtures are not terribly dangerous, but you never know. Our local Fox Sports affiliate airs a weekly Premiership match from the previous weekend, but not until Wednesday afternoon. Bleah.

I've never been one to use the words "sports" and "beautiful" in the same sentence, but I watched that game, and it was indeed a beautiful thing. Hell, it was an hanour just to watch Henry score this five goals. Beautiful, indeed.

Missed the Tottenham/Arsenal match on Sunday, but was happy to know that FSW would replay it last night at 11. Stupid FSW had rugby on instead.

I was a very displeased and tired (11 pm! I could've been sleeping!) gal.

I got hooked on Cricket as well when they showed some One-Day games between India and Zimbabwe about 2-3 years ago. Don't really watch it when (if? all I have seen are highlights of England Test matches from back in '91) they show but I try and keep up with Test matches via the BBC World Service.

Until I got FSW I never really cared about Rugby Union (I liked League since the early '90s) but now I'm hard core hooked. Super 12 (source of my nickname), NPC, internationals, the whole lot. I just wish they would bring back the Currie Cup matches - nothing like those interviews done in Afrikaans.

Go Western Stormers! Go Waikato Chiefs!

Yeah, I think due to King Rupert, they concentrate on the Southern Hemisphere in rugby, outside the Rugby World Cup. No complaints, though, I'm having a lot of fun watching Super 12.

Of course, one of the vagarities of Super 12 is that teams vary geographically from New Zealand to South Africa, so the timing on live games can vary wildly. I don't know exactly, but I think NZ is like UTC+11 and South Africa's probably something like UTC+2. That's quite a swing (and partially explains the strong home pitch advantage you tend to see, especially with/against the RSA teams).

I definitely would have enjoyed some 6 Nations or Heineken Cup play, though.

Not to quote myself or anything, but this is no longer true. Comcast added a digital sports package yesterday that, for $5 extra per month, includes NBA TV, Gol TV, three Fox Sports super-regional networks, and ... FOX SPORTS WORLD! Eeeeeeee!

Can this be true? If it happens in my area (Philadelphia), I'll be the happiest girl in the world. I'm already envisioning lounging around in my jammies in front of the Premiership match on Saturday mornings.

If you haven't been watching Rugby League from Australia, check out the State of Origin Series between Queensland (yay!) and New South Wales. SoO is perhaps the most intense "All Star"-type game going on.

AG, the DC-area counties have all added the digital sports package, so I'd be shocked if Comcast didn't offer it in Philly too.


Yep, I can't wait for August to arrive.

It's also cool that FSW is showing several Euro 2004 matches live, though the 5-day delay for the knockout rounds is quite annoying.

Yay! Currie Cup (S. Africa) and NPC (NZ) Rugby start Aug 27!

For those who didn't know already, Fox Sports World is no more. It has been rebranded as Fox Soccer Channel, which makes some sense considering that soccer constitutes about 95 percent of its programming. According to this FAQ, there will still be some rugby coverage.

So long as we still get SKY Sports News and the Fox Sports World Report each night, I'm happy. Bobby McMahon is possibly the best soccer commentator out there and the Jeremy St. Louis-Michelle Lissel anchor combo is always fun to watch.

Are they still going to do Aussie Rules during the summer? Because I love me some Sydney Swans.

I think Aussie Rules and Rugby will still get played.

And they better, otherwise I will be cranky for not being able to watch Hawthorn or Richmond suck ass yet again.

According to this article, the answer is no.

Super12 Rugby will be on 11PM Eastern Monday nights, beginning with Brumbies (Boooo!) v Crusaders (BOOOOOO!) 2/28.

Fox Soccer did end up carrying Aussie Rules Football after all; however, I just discovered many of the regional FSN channels are also showing the weekly highlights show at 5 PM local!

This just saved me $12/month, since I don't need the DirecTV Sports Pack to get my fix now.

I'm not a rugby fan, but came across this press release and wanted to pass the word along regarding FSC's future coverage.

Nooooooo! They cancelled the J-League highlight show! What will I do on Friday afternoons?

[sob]

No more Ganbare? That show was entertaining. Japanese soccer fans are craaaaaaazy (but in a good way).

And I don't get why the England-Colombia match is being tape-delayed by THREE DAYS. Sure, I can understand the PPV folks not allowing the re-broadcast tonight, but three days is a bit much for a freaking friendly and I won't bother trying not being spoiled about the result.

Aren't there any soccer fans out there in TWoP land?

What did you think of Brazil's Confederation Cup win? Foreshadowing their next World Cup victory or high-lighting faults? I mean, Mexico beat them, they looked pretty weak against Japan, but they still managed to win without their best striker Ronaldo.

Who do you think will win the World Youth Championship? I'm kind of hoping Nigeria will, though I can't believe they got by Morocco so easily. I thought Morocco had the better goalie, considering his 4 penalty saves against Italy. And poor Netherlands, yet another loss in a penalty shoot out.

Do you have a prediction on who will win the Gold Cup?

What teams in which leagues do you cheer for?
Mine:
EPL: Everton, Aston Villa, Bolton, Boro and relegated Crystal Palace, who I hope will come back up soon
Germany: Hamburg, Hertha Berlin and Mainz
Serie A: Messina and relegated Atalanta
Primera Liga: Villareal

Which national teams do you cheer for and will they make it to Germamy 2006?

Mine:
Canada - out
Mexico - should qualify
Paragauy - should qualify if they stay on track
Uruguay - struggling, they need to move up in the rankings to qualify
Ireland - tight group, too soon to tell
Netherlands - frist place is between them and the Czech Republic, but the second place team from this group will probably qualify automatically as one of the best second place teams
Croatia - they might, as long as they don't let Sweden catch them
Turkey - Ukraine will take this group, so Turkey have to hope to clinch the play-off spot away from Greece and Denmark, with a tough game against Ukraine still to play, which makes it hard since I also cheer for Greece
Greece - honestly, I don't know which one I want to get that play-off spot more


I know, that's a lot of teams. But since Canada doesn't do anything at these things, since we mostly never qualify, and I need someone to cheer for, I just kind of go for the under-dogs or Cinderella stories, or the ones with individual players that impress me.

I hope there's another soccer fan out there, somewhere. I love soccer and would love to discuss it with somebody.

Not technically FSC (which, no matter if owned by Satan Rupert Murdoch, is my new favorite channel) but did anyone see the Chelsea-DC United game on ESPN2? I kept trying to figure out how the announcers were saying Chelsea was trying to hold on to their 2-1 win when all they were doing was exhausting the DC players? Yeah, I'm a Yankee who pulls for Chelsea (and Everton and Arsenal and relegated Southampton and hopefully soon promoted Hull City) and never liked DC (even with Freddy Adu) or any of the MLS teams since Tampa folded so maybe I'm slightly more slanted.

And will any network show Chelsea and AC Milan? Because I think that would be a fun match to see just to tell if Milan can get it together or if their collapse in Istanbul was only the beginning.

SoccerTV.com

Great site to get listings of not just upcoming matches for most American and Canadian networks, but also highlight shows as well.

In any event, the Milan-Chelsea game is on GolTV, which may only be available on Direct TV.

Gol TV is available if you have Comcast digital cable and order the "digital plus" sports package (which includes FSC, Gol TV, NBA TV, and the regional Fox College Sports channels). Totally worth the extra $5 a month, given all the soccer and Sky Sports News/Fox Sports World Report that I watch.

I really liked Gol TV's coverage of Chelsky-Milan. Ray Hudson was a horrible coach but is so entertaining in his enthusiasm. Much, much better than Max Bretos and Christian Miles on FSC.

I'm a huge DCU fan and was quite amused by the fan screaming "Jose Mourinho's a wanker!" at the end of Brandi's interview with John Terry.

We´ve won 2:1 against Kaiserslautern. I can´t be happier right now. German Bundesliga rules

Mourinho is not a wanker. He is a stupid c.cks.cker. That´s for sure.

I really, really hate when British people do parodies of how they think Americans talk about soccer, as if we get everything wrong, so imagine my pain on hearing the FSC promo for the Arsenal-Newcastle match at "the Highbury." Argh.

Does no one here watch the European Football Leagues? I´d really like to discuss "European Football" with you American Soccer Fans

I'd love to discuss "European Football" but, with my schedule, by the time I've watched the games, everyone's discussed, analysed and nitpicked ad nauseum, so I don't really have much to say. Other than 'yea, what he said'.

Just got my DVD with last years Champions League Final. Oh my God that was brilliant. What Leagues can you watch in America?

Busenwitwe, technically this is a place to discuss TV coverage, specifically Fox Soccer Channel. You can talk football/soccer at a general site like bigsoccer.com.

Word on BigSoccer. It's a great site.

ESPN shows MLS and the UEFA Champions League. FSC shows the English Premiership, Bundesliga, Ligue 1, MLS, and the Argentinian League. Gol TV shows La Liga, Serie A, the UEFA Cup, and basically every other South American domestic league. It's an embarrassment of riches, actually.

The only "major" league I don't get is the Dutch Eredivisie, because my cable company doesn't offer ESPN Deportes.

Does anyone know if Dream Team will be back on FSC? Reading the synopses, obviously from years ago, on harchester.net is not the same.

On a different note, I really enjoy the 8 pm replay of a weekend match on Mondays. We are usually too busy, mostly with our daughter's games, to watch them on the weekend. Tonight's was ManU-Aston Villa; even though I knew the result it was fun to watch.

According to the FSC website the new season starts up this Thursday night.

Does anyone know if there is a internet site that may list the real time score/info of the Real Madrid vs. MLS 11 game today? I know US Soccer has match tracker for the Men & Women's National teams but I not aware of any other sites. Any help would be appreciated.

A little after the fact, but if you are looking for real-time scores like that, try soccernet.com (I know they do real-time scoring for select Premiership matches), and mlsnet.com (which is the official homepage for MLS)

As for that game (spoiler-tagged in case anyone taped it) You didn't miss much. Real thumped the MLSers 5-0

Thanks silentbob. I actually caught the show on Friday night. I had forgotten that the first show of the new season introduces so many new characters. The production seems a lot slicker than I remembered. And I am kicking myself for spoilering myself about who killed Prash. It sucks to know.

I did it accidentally (spoilered myself, that is, not killed). That last episode where he was killed was the first (and at the moment, only) episode I'd seen, and I just went looking for more info on the actors. Stupid internet ;) I have to stay away from all rugby-related sites and non-US sports pages, and the newscenter shows on FSC, from Saturday morning until Tuesday night when I've finished watching the 6 a.m. showing of the weekend's Tri-Nations match. (Although I'm so excited for Australia at New Zealand, I might actually get up impossibly early on Saturday and shell out the $25 for pay-per-view instead of waiting for the free coverage on FSC.)

Next week Champions League is starting. My Team plays at PSV Eindhoven. Hope you all enjoy Game Day 1. Auf gehts Schalke schieß ein Tor

Yay, looks like ESPN2 will be showing two Champions League matches a week now! Unfortunately, we get Lyon-Real Madrid and Manchester United-Villarreal next week. Yawn. Liverpool-Betis would've been much more interesting.

I wonder if FSC will be airing UEFA Cup matches like they did last year.

Actually, according to the ESPN2 listings the matchday 1 games will be Real Betis-Liverpool on Tuesday and Manchester United-Villareal on Wednesday

Going further, the planned broadcasts for matchday 2 (9/27-8):
Manchester United-Benfica
Liverpool-Chelsea

The ESPN2 matches for matchday 3 have not yet been decided

Winged Nike Well, yes! But ... Wow - I hang out at TWoP all the time, and never knew there were other soccer fans that gathered here in the basement. LOL Like others mentioned, I always go to bigsoccer. I am sure there are other fans too that never ventured into this thread.
Well, the teams are pretty much set now except for the playoffs between Uruguay v. Australia and Bahrain v. TnT, right? Of course, I got to root for USA. I really hope we at least match our performance in 2002. I remember watching the game v. Mexico in a soccer bar in NYC. The one time in my life I fainted was when we scored that second goal and I knew at that moment we were moving on. I screamed and carried on like such a lunatic I passed right out.

silentbob BOOO! (Said with utmost respect and good fan rivalry, of course. :)) I'm a Metro fan, so... you know. I have to say though, as a Rutgers alum, I do like Joshua Gros.

Not much traffic here, but I'll mention that the seeds and pools for the 2006 World Cup will be announced tomorrow (12/6/2005). Seeding and pooling will decide which team goes into which of the eight groups. Only Germany (as host) is given an initial seed.

ESPN2 is showing the actual draw from 3:00 to 4:00 on Friday afternoon. Many of the international networks (e.g., Sky Sports) have 90 minute shows scheduled, but I suspect the extra 30 minutes will be devoted more to fluff than actual coverage.

Tommy Smyth is gonna be on the telecast, and he'd better work the phrase "bulge in the onion bag" somehow because he's not useful for much else. It's at times like this when I really wish Bobby McMahon worked for ESPN and not FOX.

It's interesting that FIFA has decided to do the other non-seeded pooling primarily through geography. A worse-case scenario for the Americans is to be in a group with Brazil, and two strong non-seeded European teams (e.g. Netherlands and the Czechs).