Fox Soccer Channel

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Fox Soccer Channel is a United States digital cable network, owned by News Corporation, that specializes in soccer. The channel took its current name on February 7, 2005; before then, the network was known as Fox Sports World. In 2006 all non-soccer programming was dropped.

Programming

The channel focuses on soccer throughout the world. Among the matches it televises are.

England

• Multiple live and tape-delayed matches each week from the Premier League, plus weekly preview and recap shows.
• The season-opening FA Community Shield live.
• FA Cup ties, mainly in the early and middle rounds.
• England under-21 fixtures.

Argentina

One match every week from the Primera División, plus a weekly highlights show. The match is usually aired on a same-day tape delay; however, some matches are broadcast live, notably the country's biggest rivalry game, the Superclásico between Boca Juniors and River Plate.

France

Discontinued after 2005-2006 season.

Germany

Contract expired at the end of the 2005-2006 season

Italy

One live Serie A match weekly, plus Milan Magazine, a weekly newsmagazine featuring AC Milan.

Japan

A weekly highlights package from the J. League.

Australia

A weekly highlights package from the A-League.

United States

• Exclusive rights to United Soccer Leagues matches, including:
• *One live match weekly from the second-level USL First Division.
• *Occasional regular-season matches from the women's W-League.
• *The championship matches of all USL leagues—the First Division, Second Division, Premier Development League, and W-League.
• One live college soccer match weekly.

In April 2006, FSC quietly inserted a statement to their programming page that they had no plans to air MLS matches in 2006, most likely because MLS has stated an intent to sign only TV deals for which it is paid a rights fee, starting in 2007. FSC and MLS previously shared the production cost of a weekly live match and highlights show.

Other Events

• UEFA:
• *Live coverage of the UEFA Cup final.
• *Live coverage of the UEFA Women's Championship.

• CONCACAF: Live coverage of many matches in the CONCACAF Champions Cup. DISCONTINUED AFTER 2006 SEASON- coverage of the renamed CONCACAF Champions League is moving to Telefutura.

• CONMEBOL: Live and tape-delayed coverage of selected Copa Libertadores matches.

• FIFA:
• *European FIFA World Cup qualifiers, both live and tape-delayed.
• *Live coverage of the Confederations Cup. DISCONTINUED AFTER 2005 SEASON.

• *Live and tape-delayed coverage of several world championship events other than the World Cup, such as:
• **Club World Championship.
• **World Youth Championship. DISCONTINUED AFTER 2005 SEASON.
• **U-17 World Championship. DISCONTINUED AFTER 2005 SEASON.

ESPN acquired the rights to all FIFA events except for the Club World Championship, starting in 2007 and running through 2014.

Sky Sports News 1 Hour

FSC picks up the feed from its corporate cousin, Sky Sports News in the United Kingdom, Delayed from the 11pm GMT one hour nightly, and reruns the feed twice during the following 23 hours. This arrangement dates back to its days as Fox Sports World. The network has also airs an hour of Sky News, specifically the news at 10, on some weekends.

Fox Sports World Report

FSC also continues to air the Fox Sports World Report, a nightly international sports recap produced by Fox Sports World Canada, a Canadian international sports network in which News Corporation holds a minority interest along with Canwest Global Systems (parent of Global Television Network).

Additional information

Most of FSC's coverage that originates outside the CONCACAF region (North America, Central America, Caribbean) consists of picking up international broadcast feeds to which FSC has U.S. broadcast rights. All of FSC's South American coverage, including the Argentine highlights show, is overdubbed in English by FSC announcers, as is most game coverage from Continental Europe. The English coverage, and other highlight shows, generally come to FSC in English, although some shows from non-English-speaking countries (notably the French highlights show) are overdubbed by the shows' producers and not by FSC. A notable exception is Milan Magazine, which employs a combination of dubbing and subtitles.

The network's soccer coverage is not limited to game play; FSC airs Dream Team, a British soap opera that airs in the UK on FSC's corporate cousin Sky One and focuses on a fictional Premiership team (although several seasons behind Sky One). The channel also televises a live soccer talk show, Fox Football Friday, featuring viewer calls and predictions for that weekend's Premier League matches.

In 2006, Fox Soccer Channel announced that they had dropped coverage of other sports other than soccer. Amongst the leagues dropped were Super 14 rugby union, the Australian Football League (the principal Australian rules football league), and the Australian National Rugby League. The Super 14 and Australian Football League games now reside on fellow niche-sport network, Setanta Sports.

Fox Sports World filled out its schedule with an eclectic mix of programming; among the sports featured (either in anthology form or actual events) were motorsports, cricket, pool, darts, and extreme sports. FSC still airs an occasional sports anthology program.

However, FSC has not yet filled out its day with sports programming; the morning hours are usually the province of infomercials as well as the random half hour in between games on some days.

Since its relaunch as FSC, the channel has had various well-known people in and out of the soccer world do promos. The first of these aired on the Fox network pregame show for Super Bowl XXXIV. It featured Freddy Adu, Clint Mathis and Mia Hamm giving the channel's slogan: "Your world, your life, your game." Since then other celebrities have popped up doing FSC promos including David Beckham, Jon Stewart, Simon LeBon and Andy Taylor of Duran Duran, several members of the U.S. national team, Andrew Fletcher and Martin Gore of Depeche Mode, and even Paris Hilton.

Ethan Zohn, winner of in 2001, hosts a new FSC show called FC Fox.

Interviews with on-air talent Nick Webster and Max Bretos, where they discuss their work on Fox Soccer Channel, are available from EPL Talk at http://epltalk.libsyn.com

External links

• [Official Site]
• [Sky Sports]

 

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