How bizarre World Cup kick off exposed arrogant America’s $425m disaster
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
It was all fixed for the United States Women’s National Team to be playing a Women’s World Cup quarter-final in a prime time slot for TV viewers back home.
Instead, it is Spain and the Netherlands facing each other for a spot in the semi-finals — at the bizarre time of 11am (AEST) in Wellington.
The fixture is perhaps the most striking symbol of America’s miserable campaign because of what a ratings disaster it will be for national broadcast rights holder Fox Sports USA.
All the broadcaster’s best laid plans were blown up when the American team struggled through to the knock-out stages as the runner-up in Group E.
Almost everybody — particularly in America — had planned for the USWNT to finish top of the pool — a result that would have put them in the US TV-friendly time slot of a 12pm (AEST) game in Sydney for their second round match.
Instead they were famously bundled out at the hands of Sweden in one of the most dramatic penalty shootouts in recent memory. It was a fixture that most of America failed to tune in for, played at 5am New York time.
American also played two of its three group stage matches from 11am (AEST) in New Zealand — the only team to play two early fixtures during the group stage.
The pattern emerging is that there was a clear path for the United States to play almost all of their matches early in the day time in Australia and New Zealand - to accommodate TV audiences back home.
The scheduling also looked after Fox Sports, who paid a staggering $425 million for the rights to host a swath of FIFA tournaments, including the 2026 Men’s World Cup — which will be hosted in the USA, Canada and Mexico — and the 2023 Women’s World Cup.
It was all going so well.
Read on foxsports.com.au
