ESPN’s Unprecedented World Cup Coverage
It’s the most expensive production in the history of ESPN, with a crew of 300 ensconcing themselves in South Africa as I type. Breathless AP articles praise this unprecedented level of commitment:
The same network that drew criticism for calling 20 matches from U.S. studios four years ago is putting together a staff of 300 people to produce the event in South Africa. ESPN has hired British announcers and plans 65 hours of live studio programming from Johannesburg.
“We have a production plan that we think is up to the level of ambition of this event with a great group of commentators that we’ve assembled, a broadcast operation that is far and away the biggest we’ve ever amassed outside of the U.S.,” Drake [executive producer for ESPN’s World Cup coverage] said.
ESPN aren’t doing this for the sake of shits and giggles. The World Cup has become a major draw on American television, as this New York Times article highlights:
“If you ranked World Cup viewing by countries going back to 1998, the U.S. ranked 23rd,” said Kevin Alavy, director of Initiative Sports Futures, a London-based analysis firm. “In 2002, the U.S. jumped to 13th, and in 2006, it jumped again to 8th place. And we expect America to keep on jumping.”
In 2006, the ESPN-ESPN2-ABC broadcasts of the World Cup reached 70.2 million viewers while Univision reached 29.5 million, according to Nielsen Media Research.
It’s pretty obvious those rankings-by-country are aggregate numbers rather than proportions of the viewing public, but there’s no doubt ESPN are tapping into a growing audience for soccer in a massive market: “We’re definitely selling the World Cup as if the U.S. has been converted to soccer,” Ed Erhardt, the president of ESPN customer marketing and sales told the New York Times. “It’s a more diverse country than it’s ever been.”
Many bloggers and journalists, though, are less sure about whether ESPN is covering the game in the right way, particularly in the broader sense of what’s good for the game in the United States.
Paul Gardner highlighted the ambiguity of all this in his SoccerAmerica column yesterday, criticising again ESPN’s decision to go with British announcers, wondering if their approach will prove popular, and whether it will do any good for Major League Soccer:
I happen to think that ESPN has made a frightful mess of trying to work out who its World Cup television coverage should be aimed at — but I’d have to admit that it’s not an easy task. ESPN has decided to go for the Eurosnobs. What makes this rather hilarious, is that ESPN has done this without knowing anything about the Eurosnobs or about the various factions of the U.S. soccer landscape.
All we know is that the man in charge, Jed Drake, is a soccer ignoramus who is in love with British accents. And what will make matters even more hilarious is if this turns out to be the right decision.
Fake Sigi piles on from a different angle, highlighting an article on ESPN Soccernet (that’s actually wire copy from AP) about the stampede at Makhulong stadium on Sunday, summarising the piece as follows: “Mayhem! Violence! Not Uncommon! With the subtext that this is something foreign to be distrusted and viewed with suspicion.”
Fake Sigi concludes, “Maybe I’m a little sensitive, but I honestly thought ESPN of all outlets would be past this sort of thing. If this is what their idea of audience-targeted content looks like, they really do have it all wrong. ”
Maybe Fake Sigi is right in saying he’s a “little sensitive” on this one, but it does highlight the challenge ESPN faces in presenting its content (across a myriad of platforms, including television, radio, mobile, its magazine, and online) to diverse audiences, some extremely knowledgeable about soccer, some still hostile to soccer, some simply curious about soccer. Hell, that stampede article Fake Sigi links to has 265 comments to it, a good few weeks worth of comments here. Blogs like this one with a largely American readership who know the sport inside-out are but splattered bugs on the windshield of ESPN’s soccer juggernaut (just a few years ago, putting those last three words together would have seemed laughable).
The broadest conclusion to be drawn about ESPN’s unprecedented World Cup coverage is simply the good news that it reflects the growth of the sport. But that growth is fragmented, hard to measure and hard to direct appeal to (ask an MLS marketing department in the United States outside of Seattle), and this presents a massive challenge to ESPN as the premier sports outlet in the United States. It’s no wonder their coverage is something of a”frightful mess”.
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Lost amidst all of this talk about the commentators is which American voices should be placed into the booth. The conversation should be about “Why don’t we have any good US commentators?” John Harkes and Martin Tyler were incredibly awkward together during the US/Aussie warm-up. Alexei Lalas looked out of his depth when he sat-in with the ESPN Premier League crew toward the end of this past season.
Perhaps I shouldn’t paint with so broad a brush — there are good American voices out there in the sport, ESPN just doesn’t have many of them.
As much as I enjoy Martin Tyler’s call of English Premier League matches, I think it was a strange choice to make him the #1 announcer. Harkes, who I also like, was not the best choice for analyst. If I had been making the decisions, I would have made Derek Rae the first choice announcer with Thomas Rongen as his analyst.
I’m a fan of JP Dellacamera, a good American commentator. He might not be Martin Tyler, but he’s as good as Ian Darke in my book, and it will still be odd watching a US-England game without an American lead commentator.
Martin Tyler has nothing else to do this summer what with his usual employer Sky Sports having not a second of live world cup football as it is split between the two free-to-air broadcasters.
On the bright side, you should think yourself lucky that he hasn’t brought Andy Grey with him.
You should also think yourself lucky that you don’t have to put up with the truly appalling ITV commentary line-up all of whom are WOEFUL.
I would have chosen Ray Hudson, they really missed the boat there to gain new fans.
As an English person, I’m just glad that the massive wanker that is Martin Tyler has been hoisted on to a channel that I will not only not be watching, but even better, a channel that does not broadcast within 3000 miles of the room I will be watching the World Cup in. Long may my good fortune continue. I watch NHL hockey over here and the commentators always seem far more knowledge and much less annoying that English football commentators; in fact that’s true of any of the Big Four “American” sports. There MUST be a good American commentator out there for football. And if there is, can we have him for Sky please?
It always amuses/amazes me that whatever country you’re in, people are sick of their commentators…..
Over here, in the US, Martin Tyler has a good reputation. Maybe it’s hearing the same voices over and over again that in the end wears out patience. Unless you’re Jonathan Pearce, of course, in which case it only takes once.
I saw the France v. Spain friendly on ESPN Deportes and it had the huge awful ESPN score bar graphic in the top left hand corner that was cutting off the heads of the players as they ran on the field in a tight shot. There aren’t a lot of stats to bomb your viewer with in soccer. Take a minimalist approach with the size of the score and time and show the game. The score bar graphic that ESPN for some of it’s matches blocks the heads of players in close shots, blocks the ball when it’s in the air in long shots and is pointless distraction.
I think France v. Spain was an international feed with graphics added in Bristol by ESPN.Maybe they will go with the minimalist international feed graphic in South Africa. Either way, the ESPN score graphic is huge and blocks the screen.
@Tom: “It always amuses/amazes me that whatever country you’re in, people are sick of their commentators…..
“Over here, in the US, Martin Tyler has a good reputation. Maybe it’s hearing the same voices over and over again that in the end wears out patience. Unless you’re Jonathan Pearce, of course, in which case it only takes once.”
A lot of USA fans on Twitter were really unhappy with Tyler during the USA-Australia game. I think a lot of people hear announcers on Premier League telecasts and base their judgments on that, and were ecstatic that Tyler was named ESPN’s lead announcer, then discovered that he really doesn’t know much about the American players or MLS.
I paid for the entire Euro 2004 package from Setanta, and was pretty disappointed with the BBC and ITV announcers, and kept on trying to tell people that Derek Rae and Dellacamera really weren’t that much worse than what they have in Britain.
I immigrated to California 7 months ago and I’m very happy that they show Champions League and serie A and World Cup here. I moved from Europe. I have such a hard time listening to those english commentators for me it’s just as annoying as the vuvuzelas. I know the english invented this game but does that mean that they have to analyse every damn game??? Like if they are the only ones that can provide a quality coverage of a soccer game ???
They are so ful of it. Perfect example, before the game USA – England as Mc Manaman is answering the questions from his american colleague in an arrogant way like they allready won the cup like they know everything. When he was saying that England was going to win with 3-0. If they are so great in soccer, why do they have to hire a complete Italian coaching staff ??? They only talked about how great the English team is and all that but they barely talked about the coach Capello after the USA goal they started talking about him. What is Capello going to do now….. The goal against them made them look awful and the worst thing that could happen. i think it’s brave of them that they still show their faces on tv
It’s the worst thing that could happen to a team especially if their whole country wants them to win the cup, desperately.
It must have so hard for them to hire a Italian staff in order the have a better shot to win the final. AN ITALIAN COACH for ENGLAND !!!! can you imagine that ???? They are so jealous of the Italian victories that for them the only way to fight this is hiring one.
To me, every team should only consist of native players and coaches. Then the county really deserves the victory and cellebrations.
I don’t understand why an American sports network puts the Brittish in carge for all their coverage. The only reason I could think of is that they speak english with a super annoying accent. What did the English accomplish in the World Cup??? One win and a fourth place, never been runners up NEVER.
I’m watching Brasil and N. Korea now and Mc Manaman and Ruud Gullit are discussing about Maicon’s goal and Mc Manaman is so convinced that it was the keepers fault. He is just so stuborn to agree with Gullit’s explanation. My advice keep Gullit and kick out Mc Manaman. It was so fun to see how Gullit made fun of England’s disaster of the goalkeeper and Mc Manaman was dying inside
That’s what you get you piece of shit Liverpool fuck!!!
Same thing in the Champions league, they want to predict every game and they don’t know shit.
No objective coverage at all !!!! Only in their favor. They put only their teams in the picture that makes me sick.
Conclusion is, put American commentators in charge who I think are the most objective in this sport.