Fox Soccer Channel 0 – 1 GolTV

Was it me or was this past weekend one of the poorest weekends of English soccer on Fox Soccer Channel?

There was only one live game, the Sunday 1:30pm EST kick-off between Aston Villa and Manchester City (which turned out to the best match). And Saturday’s offering of the Bolton-West Ham snooze-affair and the lackluster Newcastle-Southampton match were both tape-delayed.

The biggest match of all, the Liverpool-Manchester United clash wasn’t aired until late Sunday night.

One thing you’ll notice about these FA Cup games televised by the BBC is that they always reference the results of the matches played earlier that day in the FA Cup. For example, during the Bolton-West Ham match, the Liverpool result was mentioned.

For the first time in months, I found myself channel surfing away from the English matches on Fox Soccer Channel. During the Bolton bore, I watched a little of the Stuttgart-Middlesbrough UEFA Cup tie, played in mid-week, on GolTV.

And during the Newcastle-Southampton, I watched parts of the Barcelona 5-1 demolition against Real Betis.

How many of you temporarily switched allegiances this past weekend and did the same thing?

Fair play to FSC, the channel couldn’t control the fact that Shearer would become injured for the match against his old team. And the last ten minutes of that match were very interesting, indeed, after Dyer’s goal and the 19-year old Southampton striker playing as goalkeeper for the last 10 minutes.