Fox Soccer Plus

Fox Soccer Plus (formerly Setanta Sports) is an American sports channel dedicated to soccer and rugby league. Launched in 2005 by the Irish sports broadcaster Setanta Sports to offer live and tape-delayed mainstream sports events in the United States and Caribbean, it was rebranded on March 1, 2010 as a spin-off of the now-defunct Fox Soccer after its owner News Corporation acquired the channel and its coverage rights from Setanta in January 2010.[1]

For the former sister channel, see Fox Soccer. For Fox Football Channel, the defunct soccer channel in Southeast Asia, see Fox Sports (Southeast Asian TV network) § Former channels. For the Aussie rules channels in Australia, see Fox Footy and Fox Footy Channel.

Fox Soccer Plus
SloganYour Passion is Our Passion
HeadquartersHouston, Texas, U.S.
Programming
Language(s)English
Picture format720p (HDTV)
480i (SDTV)
Ownership
OwnerFox Sports Media Group
(Fox Corporation)
Sister channelsFox Sports 1
Fox Sports 2
Fox Deportes
Big Ten Network
History
LaunchedApril 26, 2005
Former namesSetanta Sports (until February 28, 2010)
Links
Websitewww.foxsports.com/soccer/plus
Availability
Cable
Verizon FiOS1009 (SD only)
Available on most U.S. cable systemsConsult your local cable provider for channel availability
Satellite
DirecTV (US)621-1 (HD) (part-time)
621 (SD)
Dish Network (US)391 (SD only)
IPTV
AT&T Uverse1653 (HD)
Streaming media
YouTube TVInternet Protocol Television
Hulu TV via Fox Sports appInternet Protocol Television
Fubo TVInternet Protocol Television

Despite the September 2013 replacement of Fox Soccer with FXX, Fox Soccer Plus remains operational, although in recent years, the channel has lost many of its key events that had carried over from Fox Soccer Channel.

History

Launched on April 26, 2005 by Setanta Sports, which is based in Ireland, the channel had the rights to delayed Manchester United and Chelsea matches on MUTV and Chelsea TV, which were shown in segments within the channel. Any given broadcaster can only gain access to a maximum of two club channels under the current Premier League international TV rights.

As of July 27, 2009 the ownership structure of Setanta Sports North America Limited changed. Setanta Sports North America Limited was owned by Sabloss. Both Setanta Sports Channel Ireland Limited and Setanta Sports North America Limited were licensed by the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland.[2]

On January 27, 2010, Setanta Sports announced that they had reached an agreement with Fox Soccer Channel to transfer rights to select programming (soccer and rugby) that would be effective as of March 1. In addition, Setanta Sports announced that they would "cease" broadcasting the channel in the US and Caribbean on February 28, 2010.[3] The channel was rebranded from Setanta Sports to Fox Soccer Plus on March 1, 2010 at 12:00 a.m. EST.

Coverage rights

Soccer

With the loss of many of its marquee properties, very limited content remains on the channel. As of 2019, Fox Soccer Plus main soccer programming consists of live and delayed Bundesliga matches and highlight programming from the league, replays of Major League Soccer games shown on Fox or FS1, replays of FIFA events (although some events from lower level FIFA competitions that Fox holds the rights to are sometimes shown live) and occasionally, games from the Liga MX and Copa do Brasil.

Rugby League

Fox Soccer Plus continues to air rugby league content from Australia and England.

Currently, Fox Soccer Plus airs three of Australia's National Rugby League games per round, all three State of Origin games (often shown live on FS2 first), all playoff games, and the NRL Grand Final. With the exception of the Origin games, the broadcast source is Fox League, which shares the basic video feed from Nine Network but inserts its own graphics and commentators, meaning that Fox Soccer Plus viewers do not have the option of the announcers and production values of Nine.

Australian Rules Football

Fox Soccer Plus typically carries four regular-season Australian Football League matches each week, with three of those shown live and one being a replay of the one game a week shown live first on FS2; all playoffs and the Grand Final are carried, along with preseason matches and the AFL Women's league. Fox Soccer Plus coverage comes from both Fox Footy and the Seven Network.

With America-born Mason Cox playing in the league, most matches featuring Collingwood, Cox's current team, tend to be shown.

Soccer
Rugby Union
  • Rugby World Cup.
  • Live Guinness Premiership, rugby union club competition of England.
  • Live Pro14, rugby union clubs of Ireland, Italy, Scotland, South Africa and Wales.
  • Live Heineken Cup, rugby union club cup competition for 6 top European nations.
  • Live Super Rugby, rugby union clubs of, then, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. (Teams from Argentina and Japan added in later years)
  • Live IRB Sevens Rugby.
  • Live Currie Cup, rugby union club cup competition for South Africa.
  • Six Nations rugby union competition on tape delay
  • Summer and fall internationals, a mixture of live and tape delayed
  • Live Tri-Nations, international Southern Hemisphere rugby union competition.
Other Events

As Fox Soccer Plus

Fox Soccer Plus' coverage of Italy's Serie A and France's Ligue 1 ended in May 2012, after coverage of both moved to BeIN Sport starting with the 2012-2013 season.[5]

Fox Soccer Plus formerly held rights to all major properties in the SANZAAR countries—the Tri Nations involving the national teams of South Africa, New Zealand and Australia; Super Rugby, involving franchises from each of these countries; South Africa's Currie Cup; and New Zealand's ITM Cup.[6] However, in 2011, Fox Soccer Plus lost broadcasting rights for Super Rugby and Tri Nations to DirecTV.[7]

Fox Soccer Plus no longer has any rights to rugby union, previously the channel had rights to the Europe-wide Heineken Cup, the English Premiership and the Pro12 in the Celtic nations and Italy (although RaboDirect Pro 12 League matches were non-existent in Fox Soccer Plus' schedule for the first six weeks of the season).

Availability and other services

Fox Soccer Plus is available nationally on DirecTV[8] and Dish Network,[8] and regionally on Verizon FiOS,[8] Charter Spectrum,[8][9] Cablevision,[10] AT&T Uverse,[11] and several streaming services.

When the channel was known as Setenta Sports, it offered the Setanta Sports Xtra channel at no extra charge to DirecTV customers in case two live events need to be aired simultaneously.

High Definition

Fox Soccer Plus's 720p HD feed is available nationally on DirecTV (part-time),[12] and regionally on Charter Spectrum,[13][9] AT&T U-verse,[11] and Cablevision.[14]

Former services

Setanta Premium

As a part of Setanta Sports, Setanta Premium was available only to select commercial subscribers for Pay-Per-View events while most are broadcast delayed on the full-time channel.

This service charged customers a cover charge of $10–$20 per head, depending on the match.

Setanta Broadband

During its existence as Setanta Sports, Setanta also offered a broadband subscription service, Setanta Broadband, which allowed customers with a high speed internet connection to view some of the Setanta Sports channel content on their computers and includes access to pay-per-view events. Portuguese Liga soccer was available and Premier League matches were also broadcast starting the 2007-08 season on Setanta Broadband. Broadband customers did not receive Australian Football League matches as of July 2008, due to the league's new distribution deal with aussiesport.tv.

References
  1. Fox Soccer Plus Kicks Off As Premium, HD Channel On March 1 Multichannel News January 11, 2010
  2. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on June 7, 2011. Retrieved March 26, 2010.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  3. Setanta Sports USA To Go Dark Feb. 28 - Premium Network, Transferring More Programming Rights To Fox Soccer, Will Also Cease Caribbean Operations Multichannel News January 27, 2010
  4. "ESPN Adds Premier League To Soccer Line Up - World Soccer Talk". August 6, 2009.
  5. Al Jazeera to Kick Off Pair of Soccer Channels in U.S. this August Multichannel News, May 17, 2012
  6. "Fox Soccer Plus FAQ" (PDF). Fox Cable Networks. April 7, 2010. Archived from the original (PDF) on April 15, 2010. Retrieved April 13, 2010.
  7. International Super Rugby Broadcasters
  8. Fox Soccer Plus Set to Launch March 1 with DirecTV, Dish Network, Time Warner Cable, and Verizon FiOS Archived January 18, 2012, at the Wayback Machine Fox Soccer Plus Press Release February 26, 2010
  9. Bright House adds HD channels to lineup Archived June 18, 2010, at the Wayback Machine Daytona Beach News-Journal June 15, 2010
  10. "Fox Soccer Plus on iO TV".
  11. AT&T U-verse Launches Fox Soccer Plus HD Multichannel News February 21, 2011
  12. DIRECTV and its Television Partners Offer More World-Class Soccer Than Ever Before Archived August 17, 2010, at the Wayback Machine DirecTV Press Release August 10, 2010
  13. Time Warner adds high-def soccer channels in time for World Cup San Antonio Business Journal March 19, 2010
  14. "Optimum Cable TV, On Demand Movies, PPV- Optimum TV". www.optimum.com.
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