Televised Soccer Update: UEFA Champions League & EPL
This morning is a reminder of how quickly we've gone from famine to feast when it comes to watching televised soccer in this country.
Here it is around noon on Wednesday and as a DirecTV subscriber I have a choice of a UEFA Champions League mix on Channel 461 although at the moment it's only showing two of up to eight games (why I'm not seeing the game between Moldova's FC and Greece's Olympiakos since I subscribe to Fox Soccer Channel is a mystery to me though).
DirecTV channels are showing games (for the first time ever) so I could check out Timisoara-Stuttgart on Channel 462 or Copenhagen-Apoel Nicosia on Channel 463 if I was so inclined. (DirecTV channels 461-466 will show games live).
Up on Fox Sports Southwest on Channel 676, (yup, Fox channels other than FSC are now showing games, too) it's Celtic-Arsenal in hi def.
And ESPN channels will continue showing games as they have in year's past.
Indeed, it's become so difficult to keep track of what's on where and when that Fox has unveiled a television schedule and dedicated UEFA Champions League news Web site here.
BTW, the UEFA Champions League has a slightly different format this year. Here's a primer.
This latest television soccer development comes just five days after ESPN announced hours before the curtain rose on a new EPL season that the league would return to the network after an absence of more than 10 years (games will also continue on FSC and other outlets).
There will be almost 50 games in hi def on ESPN2, something that will hopefully spur FSC on to do the same sooner rather than later.
For instance, next up at 7 a.m. Saturday is Wigan-Manchester United, followed at noon Monday, Aug. 24 by Liverpool-Aston Villa.
Don't let the batteries in that remote control run out.
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About 100 Percent Soccer
Sportswriter Nick Green has written the 100 Percent Soccer column since 2005 for the Daily News, Daily Breeze and other Los Angeles area newspapers. The blog of the same name began in 2007. A native of England, he began writing about soccer in the mid-1980s and in 2000 permanently exchanged a seat in the stands for one in the press box. He lives six miles from Carson's Home Depot Center, home of the Los Angeles Galaxy, Chivas USA and the training headquarters for U.S. Soccer and is married to a long-suffering soccer widow. Join Nick on FaceBook and follow him on Twitter.
Nick by any chance did the Chivas USA FO state they would sign anyone else, particularly Maicon dos Santos Corrêa who is trialing with the team?
Nick replies: I couldn't make it out to today's press event, but my understanding is no more new signings were specifically mentioned. No decisions have been made on Maicon, a 25-year-old Brazilian striker who most recently played in Tunisia, and has been on trial with Chivas USA for about two weeks.