FA Cup tie switched to Thursday . . . for just three TV stations globally
Tomorrow night’s FA Cup tie at Fulham, which was moved to Thursday in order to facilitate global TV coverage, appears to have been selected for broadcast by just three channels.
Repeated requests by The Watford Observer to the FA for confirmation of which countries and channels are taking the game have not, so far, elicited any form of response.
However, by checking various websites which display listings of live sports events, it seems that ESPN+ (America), Sport 2 (Israel) and TRT Spor (Turkey) will be showing the game live.
When the change of date was originally announced, the FA said they couldn’t, at that point, confirm which territories would be showing the game but sent The Watford Observer a list of more than 30 different broadcasters around the world who could choose to show the game, and said they would provide an update nearer the day of the game.
That update has not arrived, the game is tomorrow - and it seems that less than 10% of the channels have chosen to broadcast the game.
ESPN+ offers by the far the biggest audience as it covers the whole of America, though it is a subscription-only streaming service.
Local time in America means viewers would be watching the game in the early afternoon.
With Turkey being three hours ahead of UK time, viewers there will need to sit up beyond midnight to see the end of the game – the two-hour time difference with Israel means the game will kick-off at 9.45pm local time.
Watford supporters have a relatively short journey for their game, which only becomes slightly more problematic should extra and time and penalties be required as getting the last trains home might be trickier.
Spare a thought, though, for Peterborough fans, whose tie at Everton has also been moved to tomorrow night and is being shown live by the BBC behind the red button, on iPlayer and online, as well as in Ireland, Israel and Portugal.
It means a 350-mile round trip on a Thursday night, and the switch of that tie from the original Saturday date has drawn criticism from all sides, including Everton fans who sympathise with the travelling Posh supporters.
While the FA moved a number of games for TV purposes, it seems that only two – Fulham v Watford tomorrow, and Chelsea v Morecambe on Saturday at 3pm – have not been picked up by either ITV or BBC, be that for broadcast on their main TV channels, regionally (ie BBC One Wales), online or via iPlayer.