ESPN+ will exclusively stream every game of the United Soccer League’s inaugural 2019 season, the league announced Wednesday. USL League One is the new U.S. Soccer Federation-sanctioned Division-III league.
USL League One’s inaugural season begins Mar. 29, and postseason play will take place in October. The agreement with ESPN+ covers all matches. Between an existing deal with the USL Championship (the second division of U.S. Soccer) and the new deal with USL League One, over 700 live matches will appear on ESPN+ this upcoming season. The platform also carries MLS games, meaning ESPN+ will livestream matches from all of the top three recognized tiers of U.S. soccer in 2019.
“This is a big moment for League One,” said Steven Short, Senior VP of League One, in a press release. “Placing the league side-by-side with some of the best professional soccer in North America and the rest of the world on ESPN+ will create major visibility to League One’s inaugural season. It will allow us to showcase the best of what this league will have to offer for fans across the United States.”
A total of 10 teams will compete in USL League One’s first season. Games will be produced by USL Productions, the league’s south Florida-based broadcast studio. In addition to streaming the top three soccer leagues in the U.S., ESPN+ also has rights to stream Italy’s Serie A, England’s FA Cup, the English Football League’s Championship and League One, the Dutch Eredivisie, Australia’s A-League, and the UEFA Nations League.
SportTechie Takeaway
Since launching in April 2018, ESPN+ has logged over two million subscribers. The $4.99 per-month subscription service recently added UFC fights to its streaming repertoire, resulting in the most new subscriptions in one weekend that the platform has ever seen. Lower level North American soccer leagues may not have had much of an opportunity to broadcast their products in front of a wide audience five years ago, but the growth of streaming platforms has drastically changed that.