There have been quite a few people complaining about how much of CBS’ coverage of the UEFA Champions League’s 2019-20 season resumption will be streaming-only on CBS All-Access (perhaps somewhat understandable considering their late pickup of the season after Turner Sports opted out of their existing deal; it’s notable that CBS All-Access offers a month-long free trial, and that CBS plans to televise more games in future years), but CBS isn’t the only way to watch these games. And the situation is going to be very different when it comes to Univision’s Spanish-language coverage of the Champions League.
Univision has the Spanish-language rights to the UEFA Champions League through 2023-24 after an extension earlier this year, and they’ve historically shown quite a lot of them on TV. They’ve seen ratings benefits from that, and it’s played into their larger soccer-focused strategy. And they announced Thursday that they’ll be televising every remaining UEFA Champions League game across their broadcast (Univision and UniMás) and cable (TUDN and Galavisión) networks. Here’s more from their release:
Emmy-winning “Fútbol Central” pre-game show will precede all UEFA Champions League matches, while TUDN’s flagship program “Misión Europa” will provide highlights and post-game analysis. TUDN’s team of sportscasters includes UEFA Champions League winner and Ballon D’or 1994 Hristo Stoichkov, legendary Real Madrid and Inter de Milan striker Iván Zamorano, iconic UEFA Champions League commentators Luis Omar Tapia and Diego Balado. Coverage also includes European soccer experts Marc Crosas and Jose Hernández and hosts Alejandro Berry, Lindsay Casinelli, Tony Cherchi and Adriana Monsalve.
And here’s their schedule table (all times Eastern):
Date Matchup Time Network
Round of 16:
8/7 Manchester City vs. Real Madrid 2 p.m. UniMás/ TUDN
8/7 Juventus vs. Lyon 2 p.m. Galavisión
8/8 Barcelona vs. Napoli 2 p.m. Univision/ TUDN
8/8 Bayern München vs. Chelsea 2 p.m. Galavisión
Quarter-Finals:
8/12 Matchup TBD 2 p.m. UniMás/ TUDN
8/13 Matchup TBD 2 p.m. UniMás/ TUDN
8/14 Matchup TBD 2 p.m. UniMás/ TUDN
8/15 Matchup TBD 2 p.m. Univision/ TUDN
Semi-Finals:
8/18 Matchup TBD 2 p.m. Univision/ TUDN
8/19 Matchup TBD 2 p.m. Univision/ TUDN
Final:
8/23 Matchup TBD 1:30 p.m. Univision/ TUDN
It’s certainly interesting to see Univision committing to airing the rest of this year’s UEFA Champions League on TV, with quite a lot of it on broadcast. And this will be available digitally as well, with all of these matches available digitally to all authenticated TUDN subscribers via the TUDN app and TUDN.TV. So if people don’t want to deal with signing up for even a free trial of CBS All-Access, these matches will be available on TV, albeit in Spanish.
