Mexico v England pulled huge numbers in the US

Fox really looked at a massive game and decided to make it sound like a library session lmao the crowd was probably louder in the pub than on the broadcast and that is just embarrassing for them
 
The ratings are impressive, but they also reflect the scale of the occasion rather than one broadcaster alone. Mexico and England is the kind of fixture that can pull in casual viewers, and the US game afterwards only added to the momentum. Still, a better presentation would probably have helped even more.
 
The broader point here is that football in the US is not struggling for interest when the match has the right ingredients. Mexico, England, and then the USA game afterwards gave the whole day a sense of occasion that most sports would kill for, and the numbers back that up. What always gets missed in these debates is that the audience is not just hardcore fans, it is families, casual viewers, Mexican-American households, people checking in because the game feels important, and that is why the total becomes so huge. Then you have the broadcast side of it and suddenly everyone is arguing about sound mixing and pundits and whether Peacock is better value than Fox, which is fair enough, but it also shows how fragile the whole viewing experience is because if the product is even slightly off people notice immediately. And honestly that is the story to me, the sport is strong enough to attract massive attention, but the TV companies still manage to make it feel like a fight between platforms instead of a celebration of the game
 
The numbers are the headline, but the bigger takeaway is how much the right fixture can still matter in football media. A high-profile Mexico game plus England is always going to have pull, and the USA match after it gave the whole broadcast block real momentum, so from a commercial point of view it makes perfect sense. But then you actually watch the coverage and it is the same old mess, the crowd sounds muted, the presentation feels stiff, and you end up thinking how much bigger it could have been with a better broadcast partner, and honestly i am sick of these networks acting like they are doing us a favour when they are the ones cashing in on it
 
I dont really buy the idea that Fox alone is responsible for people turning off because the match itself was always going to do huge numbers with those teams involved and the Mexico factor especially is massive in the US so it was never just about the TV package, people wanted to watch the occasion and the rivalry and the atmosphere, and the broadcaster is only part of that
 
I watched part of it with a few mates and even the casuals were glued to it because it just had that big match feel from the start, honestly it was one of those nights where you check the time and realise two hours have gone by and everyone is still arguing about the coverage and the atmosphere and the fact that it somehow felt bigger than most games we get over here
 
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