The Wall Street Journal reports that ABC and ESPN are being criticized by some hard core soccer fans for “Americanizing” its coverage of The World Cup. This criticism comes amid mounting evidence that ABC and ESPN are succeeding in attracting more English-speaking American viewers to The World Cup than ever before. According to the article:
The World Cup is generating record television audiences for soccer in the U.S. But some die-hard fans think the coverage deserves a red card…. A major gripe: ESPN selected an announcer, Dave O’Brien, who had never called a soccer game before this year to serve as the tournament’s lead play-by-play man…. U.S. soccer executives have complained to ESPN about the overuse of graphics and cut-away shots, which have interrupted the flow of matches….
Industry executives credit ESPN for providing the most extensive promotion and coverage of soccer ever in the U.S. Mr. Drake says the ratings back up ESPN’s choices. Before the quarterfinals began last Thursday, ABC averaged 3.7 million viewers for 10 games. On cable, ESPN and ESPN2 averaged 1.8 million and 1.1 million viewers, respectively, for the other 46 matches.
I think that the criticisms of ABC and ESPN’s coverage of The World Cup are pretty baseless. They are the only broadcaster in the United States who can put all 64 games of this tournament on sports-oriented channels that reach most of the potential viewers in the country. Compare their coverage of The World Cup to NBC’s coverage of The 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin. I say there is no contest, ABC and ESPN have done a far better job.
People have criticized ABC and ESPN for not having “enough staffers with soccer experience directing the tournament’s 64 games from the company’s headquarters in Bristol”. At least they are producers with sports experience.
The hard part of covering The World Cup for ABC and ESPN is that they have fewer production cycles in which to improve than OLN does in its coverage of The Tour de France. By the time the next World Cup rolls around for ABC in 2010, OLN will have produced three more Tours. OLN has a lot more opportunity to fine-tune its production as the audience evolves.
The main thing that ABC and ESPN have going for them is that the audience likely to watch soccer in the United States is bigger and its clearly growing. Who knows if we can say that about cycling in the post-Armstrong era?
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