EPL has hit maintstream US television market

European club soccer is one of the fastest-growing televised sports in the United States, reports Sam Mamudi. Three Premier League games on ESPN this season have garnered more than 500,000 viewers, according to Nielsen Co. February’s Premier League game between Chelsea and Liverpool was the most-watched broadcast in Fox Soccer Channel’s history, with an average audience of 418,000. Fox Soccer’s average audience for the last full Premier League season, from August 2009 to May 2010, was up roughly 75 percent from the previous year.

The figures are comparable to those for National Hockey League games or regular-season college basketball games. That's all the more impressive given that Fox Soccer Channel is only in 40 million homes — about 40 percent of cable-owning households — and, unlike U.S. sports, games are virtually never in prime time.

“The growth of audiences for international soccer has been taking off,” said Stephen Master, vice president of Nielsen Sports. “These are very impressive numbers, especially considering the time slots.”

Said Scott Guglielmino, senior vice president of programming at ESPN, “The audience growth we’re seeing for the Premier League is right up there with our top sports."