Italy Game Was Ratings Hit

Give me more guts and glory. More bleeding and elbows. More red cards. This type of game was well suited for America.

Posted from  United States

Fabio,
Well said, that is exactly is our American psychic and frankly that’s why we watch sports. While the rest of the world enjoys the skills the tactics of the beautiful game, we want war. And of course the network thrives on that. I couldn’t described it better myself, lol.

Whatever gets people into the game. I think that’s what first appealed to me about the world cup and set it appart from any other sport- the clash of nations. I guess since everyone competes in the same sport and a team sport at that, is what makes the olympics pale in comparison.

Posted from  United States

Not to pile on the ESPN commentators (oh, OK, what the hell…), if you add the viewers like me who *normally* would have watched the English-language broadcast but turned to Univision, the numbers would be even higher.

Same switched to Univision after only about 15 minutes.

Posted from  United States

isn’t that why we watch events like this, to be able to act like complete lunatics in front of our family members?…lol

Posted from  United States

I am happy to report that I’ve dumped ESPN for good. I get the video from Univision (better picture quality than ESPN with no annoying pop-ups) and I get the audio from XM Radio. The audio is about 5 seconds behind, but I have a DVR cable box, so a simple pause-resume of 5 secs. on the live TV and I’m all sync’ed up and Dave O’Brien free!!!! I love technology!

Posted from  United States

Vic: sounds like an excellent combination. Too bad in the States we have to resort to that sort of thing….

This game was exactly what Americans like: fast paced, slick passing, and bone crunching tackles.

I was screaming the entire match.

I also think some of the US fans could learn the simple Spanish chants like: Olaaaaaay, Ole ole ole, Landooooooooon, Donovaaaaaaaaan (Okay, I added the LD in place of Diego)

Another one is: “Aguante Estados Unidos, Aguante!”

Posted from  Dominican Republic

my personal fav is….GOOOOOOOLLLLLLLL!

Posted from  United States

My apologies from a former post where people flamed the announcers and I didn’t think they were quite so bad. They were. And are! I watched the US v. Italy game on ABC and was ready to kick the s$#% out of both De Rossi and Marcello Balboa.

What a great game for new fans to turn on to, and what a display after that first game…

Posted from  United States

The ratings? Nothing to do with the announcers, picture quality or anything else. Just an extremely good match with a suprisingly good US side-something that’s not talked about enough. Italy was not “down” or “disinterested”, they were playing at full strength, full force, taking the US seriously and with every intention of winning the match. And despite the fact that Italy is an elite side, we played with them, step for step. It wasn’t like we played way over our heads or anything, that was really our game. I think the fact that the US had a real chance to win the match even after we were 10 v 9 kept the crowd glued to the tube.

Posted from  United States

Somebody needs to make posters of Brian McBride after he got clobbered by DeRossi. Blood all over his face. It would be so awesome. Like everybody is saying, the blood and guts game is what Americans seem to like. My roommate who is not a big soccer fan at all got so excitied and riled up during that game (as did I). It was nice to see a soccer hater get into the game like that.

Posted from  United States

I think if US fans saw a typical premiership clash they would like soccer more then what they see in the MLS

Although the MLS has grown by leaps and bounds the past ten years.

Posted from  Dominican Republic

Yeah that’s why every other country watches the game sober and sits there quietly observing every move.

Then who are those drunk screaming fans jumping up and down, and the Croatian who ran on the field? Must have been born in America.

The truth is everyone is the same, it’s human nature to be that way. I loved in Australia for 3 years and they were no different.

Once again, my point is it’s human nature to get excited when you see blood and guts.

lived* durrr lol

This is fantastic news. I guess it’s true what they say: Blood sells!

Now if only we could incorporate sex somehow.

Posted from  United States

I bet the ratings will be high (for a Thursday morning, anyway) when we play Ghana. Excitement has been building after the draw against Italy. I think people who watched that game realized the US wasn’t going to go away with a whimper after all.

I think that ESPN has done remarkably well this tournament. There seems to be good coverage of highlights from other games, mini player profiles and brief interviews. I like the commetary of Wynalda, Foudy, and Lalas, especially after the Czech game because you can see that they were fans who were as mad as we were if not more.

There was also coverage on SportsCenter, which used to be HORRIBLE about covering soccer.

There is no doubt in my mind that soccer is here to stay in the minds of the American sports fan, but my main complaints about the coverage (I think) has to do with the fact that soccer is still lower on the list of sports that the American sports fan is interested in.

My first complaint is that there (sometimes) is no lead in or connection between games. Some of the days (maybe it was weekends) after the game was over, there was unrelated programming until right before the next game. I usually chaged the channel to Univision to watch other pre-game coverage, including the players waiting to take the field, national anthems, etc. Too often in the Olympics, we see TOO MUCH coverage about a single player or about the host country, but in this case I would like to see a little more, especially about what’s going on around each venue.Also at least one game (Sweden/Paraguay)changed from one of the ESPN stations to the other so, having taped it, I missed it.

The second is the annoying repetition of the commercials and not just the overplayed Nike one, but even the other American-centric businesses. Why are there no interesting commercials for American audiences with the American players or with Americans talking about soccer. This is where I think the coverage is lesser because the popularity here is lesser than other sports.

Can anyone tell me, is Nike showing a wider variety of soccer related commercials in other countries, or do we all have to put up with the same Jose+10?

Posted from  United States

Same Jose in Italy Anthony. It’s a big surprise reading Americans complain about the quality and poor variety of commercials while here we just can’t stand their existence. I agree on what Jono said excitement for blood and guts is not American it’s part of the human nature. Ever heard of gladiators 2 thousands years ago?
The game against us italians could have given non-football fans in America a sample of how thrilling can be football. Now they just need a fine display of skills and they’ll be catched.
Karl good point on the clash of nations. A world cup is a place were nationalism is allowed and not blamed. It’s a pacific display of nationalism that we just need every 4 years. It’s great part of its charme.

Posted from  Italy

The other problem is the ridiculous pop-up graphics with meaningless information that obscure vital parts of the field at exactly the wrong times.

Posted from  United States

I have to agree with Troglodyte. Too many times there have been “info” bubbles that appear directly over the play action. It’s hard enough to see when you’re watching on a tiny TV, let alone with all of ESPN’s screen clutter.

Posted from  United States

I think it’s an artifact of American football coverage, in which the flanks are relevant for only seconds at a time. But in real football they’re often obscuring the most important play.

Posted from  United States

I’ll second (or third or whatever) about the comments on the graphics comming in at the wrong time. And they’re so big too – very annoying.

And what about those instant replays? Too many times, the camera is zoomed too far in and they easily lose track of the ball or we don’t get a total view of the play. Again, very annoying.

Definately haven’t been a fan of the commentating, especially from the former players. Yea, we all get passionate, but many times it’s just way over the top and not insightful at all. Just compare to every other sporting event you’ve watched or heard on the radio – quite a contrast.

And the ads… What I think it really comes down to is what companies felt would be worth to advertise during the WC. I bet too many figured it wouldn’t be worth it, but I think its pretty safe to say that they figured wrong. Sadly, we’re left with José +10 (even though he never really does win the game, eh?) and others ad nauseum. Too bad none of the Joga Bonito clips never made it on.

–Travis

Posted from  United States

For games the weekend before, Univision averaged about a 2.5 share. And they got a 5.4 for the Mexico-Iran game. So I’m betting they got at least a 3.0 for the US-Italy game..

Add those up and you get an 8.2 share for the US-Italy game. If you count bars etc., about 10 million people watched the game in the US.

That’s not bad considering that Game 5 of the NBA finals got a 13 share. And that the Stanley Cup playoffs have NEVER done better than a 5.2 share (in 1992).

Posted from  United States

Italy isgana win this time usa sucks

Posted from  Canada