Most-watched soccer games on US TV for July 8-13 2020

MLS is Back! The league returned last week averaging 300,875 viewers on English-language ESPN, FOX and FOX Sports 1 in the 8PM ET and 10:30PM ET start times, down about 10% from the leagues average English-language audience in the first two weeks of the season back in March. Over on Spanish-language TUDN, the opening matches have averaged 53,200 viewers. ESPN averaged 337,500 viewers for their first four late MLS is Back broadcasts, down from about 391,000 in the network’s first three MLS broadcasts of 2020, but up nearly 80,000 average viewers from the network’s average in 2019. The league’s first three post-COVID hiatus broadcasts on FS1 are drawing very similar audiences to that network’s average in 2019, averaging around 157,000 viewers.

Univision’s coverage of the Copa por Mexico tournament continued this week as the group stage ended, with viewership peaking on Saturday for Club América’s match against Cruz Azul. A total of 726,000 viewers tuned in, making the friendly the third most-watched soccer match on American television last week. Univision’s coverage of 11 of the tournaments 12 matches averaged 307,182 viewers.

The Premier League on NBC drew its second-largest audience since returning last month on Saturday, drawing 945,000 viewers for Sheffield United’s 3-0 victory over Chelsea. This brings NBC’s average for the 2019-2020 Premier League season up to 831,379 viewers, running about even with the league’s average audience in the 2018-2019 season.

HT ShowBuzz Daily