Pre post match analysis

Ok I am working on the reviews of USA's dominance of Mexico and the UNC Duke basketball game, but before I do that I have to get this off of my chest. People always say that soccer will never be very big in the United States and before I thought that they were wrong. I have always thought that if it gets enough air time and better, more recognizable players come to play here then it could happen. I saw something last night while watching the qualifier that really hurt soccer's chances in the US. For some damn reason our television networks have no understanding of how to cover the sport. First off the announcers are god awful, but that is expected as I hate most announcers in all sports. The main issue I have with the coverage is the camera work. The network always switches to camera close ups on the man with the ball so you can't see exactly what's going on. Ok, cool I can see really closely what the ball is doing on the guys feet, but I have no idea how close he is to actually having a chance at goal. Another thing that pisses me off is when they do close ups of a players face when something is happening thirty yards up field. I don't give a crap about Onyewu's facial structure, where is the ball for Christ's sake. Finally, the unnecessary game breaks in the middle of the action. They will show other things that happened in sports that day that are old news, and they put the live game on a mini screen, as if you could actually make out what is going on in a 3 by 3 centimeter picture.

I don't know why the networks do this to the game, but they need to watch the coverage of the English Premiership to get some pointers. It can be extremely frustrating to watch.