The nation’s 13th largest multiple system operator has just pleased soccer fans in a few major markets in Kentucky and Ohio. Insight Communications, offering cable, Internet and phone service, has recently added Fox Soccer Channel HD to its already broad selection of high-definition channel offerings.

Headquartered in New York City, the $1.26 billion revenue-generating company took some time to add the highly demanded channel, but footie fans who were watching on Tuesday would have been surprised by their fortune. Specifically serving areas in Kentucky near Lexington, Bowling Green, Louisville, Northern Kentucky, in Ohio near Columbus and Indiana in Evansville, Tuesday’s addition of the beautiful game in HD by one Lexington citizen was simply described as “beautiful”.

As of press time, the only two major markets where FSCHD has been added are Lexington, KY and Columbus, OH (channels 921 and 929 respectively). Should soccer fans reside in any of the other geographical areas listed above who subscribe to Insight and wish to receive FSCHD, those such fans are encouraged to contact your local office and demand that the channel be added.

Watching Aston Villa versus Everton today on Fox Soccer Channel, it’s such a troubling admission that I have a problem. I love football. I can’t get enough of it. I sit at work on a Monday afternoon and wonder about the Man City result. On a Thursday morning, instead of paying attention to quality control on the files in front of me, I’m imagining the possible opponents of my beloved Portsmouth in the next round of the Carling Cup. And my weekends are spent in England, Germany, Spain, Italy and maybe even Brazil with thousands of rabid fans, cheering the highs and bemoaning the lows through my television.

But I have to do it with frustration, as my TV is often turned to Fox Soccer Channel, the ex-girlfriend whose number I can’t throw away. I love FSC for one reason – they put on the beautiful game and little else, outside of a guaranteed Proactiv commercial during every break. The feed is of poor quality, as volume levels randomly go up and down. The picture goes choppy or freezes, then returns a few seconds later to taunt me, knowing I’m no longer looking at a live shot of the action.

The picture quality is, quite plainly, atrocious for any sport. After a summer of being treated to HD on the ABC / ESPN family of networks for the World Cup, I endure something that shouldn’t even be called any level of “definition.” It only reminds me of the days when my cable box had a dial on it, and the channel numbers stopped at 36.

I know that Fox is not entirely responsible for Verizon’s FiOS not offering the channel in HD, but can’t they carry some of the blame? I get TLC and ABC Family in HD – why do I need to see reenactments of women who didn’t know they were pregnant in hi-def? Is HD really going to make Sixteen Candles a visual masterpiece? I would like Fox to, quite simply, try harder to get FSC HD on all available providers. No excuses. It’s the beautiful game. Watching football on FSC is essentially what it would be like if the producers of Mad Men had Christina Hendricks wear a beekeeper’s suit every week.

Much has already been said about FSC’s other programming choices, so I won’t rehash all of it. However, I can confirm that I am NOT interested in what Susan Sarandon has to say on Soccer Talk Live tomorrow. Really? Susan Sarandon? I think she’s a very talented actress, but in the first few shows of a supposedly “cutting-edge” football program, this is who they’re booking? Was Dina Lohan not available? Or can we perhaps expect Flavor Flav on an upcoming episode?

I love the sport of football. Nothing else comes close for me. But Fox Soccer Channel certainly presents obstacles in my love affair with the game. Like that ex-girlfriend of mine, there’s a seemingly endless list of bad qualities. However, all the negatives are put up against the one thing  that’s done so well. FSC shows football matches. A lot of them. So, like the ex’s phone number, until a better option comes along or it changes dramatically for the better, I’ll hang on to FSC.

But they should be worried about how I’ll feel tomorrow.

Fox Soccer Channel HD is expected to launch on DirecTV on August 11, sources confirmed to EPL Talk on Tuesday.

It’s been a long and anxious time for soccer fans in the United States who have been waiting for news regarding the announcement. Fox Soccer Channel HD began broadcasting in HD in late January and then originally launched on DISH Network in early February. Slowly but surely, Fox Soccer Channel HD has been added to TV providers across the United States. But the largest satellite provider, DirecTV, hasn’t added the 24/7 soccer network as of yet, but will now do so in August, six months after the launch of Fox Soccer Channel HD.

DirecTV is also working on adding Fox Soccer Plus in HD in the near future.

As of press time, there is no word from Comcast regarding when they, as one of the largest TV providers, will add Fox Soccer Channel HD to its programming. But as soon as we get news, EPL Talk will report it here. In the meantime, please reference How to Demand Your TV Provider Adds Fox Soccer Plus or FSCHD.

In addition to the expected launch of Fox Soccer Channel HD on August 11, sources advised that GolTV HD is supposed to be added to DirecTV on August 4.

Fox Soccer Channel’s weekly soccer call-in program Fox Football Fone-In has been canceled according to the Beyond The Pitch podcast.

The show originally began in 2004 as Fox Football Friday, but since then it has changed almost everything including hosts, formats, days of the week, name of the show, sets, co-hosts and more in the hopes of developing a winning formula that would generate decent viewing audience numbers. However despite the addition of Eric Wynalda to the show last summer, who along with Nick Webster hosted arguably some of the best episodes of the show culminating in pre-World Cup appearances in New York CIty inside a pub swelling with soccer fans, the decision has been made that the show will not continue.

Replacing Fox Football Fone-In (FFF) will be a new show with a working title of Talk Live. It’ll be hosted by Kyle Martino, the former Columbus Crew and LA Galaxy midfielder who also made several appearances for the US men’s national team. Martino was most recently one of the commentators for ESPN Radio’s live coverage of the 2010 World Cup tournament.

Webster is a producer at Fox Soccer Channel and a regular columnist at FoxSoccer.com.

As of press time, a spokesperson for Fox Soccer Channel was unavailable for comment.

UPDATE (July 30): Kyle Martino has updated his Twitter account to announce that he’s leaving ESPN and has confirmed that he’s going to be doing the show for Fox Soccer Channel.

Weeks from now, the opening game of the 2010 Barclays New York Challenge will have faded from most people’s memories when the regular season kicks off. It wasn’t a particularly exciting game, and Spurs looked lethargic and out of ideas for large portions of the game. However, the match between Tottenham Hotspur and New York Red Bulls should be remembered for another reason: a massive technological breakthrough which could have a dramatic impact on how we watch the sport for years to come.

Last night’s game was streamed live across the Internet for free. Veetle hosted the live streaming game on their website. And, which is so unlike what bloggers are used to, were encouraged to embed the video player on their website (including this one) to share with viewers around the world (except for the United Kingdom where the licensing rights prevented the game from being streamed there). And all of this by Veetle was done legally with the permission of the event organizers.

But the big technological breakthrough for me was the ability to stream the live game to the Apple iPhone and Apple iPad. Veetle streamed the game using QuickTime so that soccer fans could load up Safari on the iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad, browse to Veetle.com and watch the game on the portable device. To see how it worked on my Apple iPad, view the above video and you’ll see the high quality video streaming live.

With any technology, there are always hiccups. The Apple iPhone version didn’t work and displayed an error message. And when viewing the game from the streaming web version on my computer, there were a couple of times during the match when the live streaming played only the audio (presumably because of bandwidth demands on Veetle’s servers).

But overall, I would consider the experiment a success. The quality of the stream was superb. There was no buffering. And the display on my iPad was a better reception than what I saw on television through Fox Soccer Channel’s broadcast of the game.

The game from Veetle gives us a hint of what is possible. Just in one two-hour period, we saw how the quality of the Veetle broadcast was far superior to the Flash-video that FoxSoccer.tv provides. And we saw how accessible it is, such as the iPad (unfortunately, FoxSoccer.tv doesn’t work on the iPad or iPhone at this time).

If you didn’t get a chance to experience the game last night on Veetle, your next chance is tonight when Manchester City plays Sporting Lisbon at 8:30pm ET. We’ll again be showing the game live here at EPL Talk. Plus you can access it through the Veetle website and on TV via Fox Soccer Channel.

According to sources, ESPN and Fox Sports International are currently in negotiations for FSI to sublicense some of the Barclays Premier League TV rights in the U.S. through 2013 to ESPN.

However, a deal has not yet been signed. And soccer fans in the United States will have to wait until an agreement is reached before they know which games will be televised on which TV networks.

Soccer fans in the United States are used to waiting. While there are still 25 days to go until the 2010-11 Premier League season begins, many soccer fans will remember the last minute deal that was made by Fox and ESPN the night before the 2009-10 season kicked off so that ESPN2 could show the season opener between Chelsea and Hull City.

According to sources, it is understood that ESPN is looking for expanded rights in the U.S. that will allow the company to feature the matches on more platforms than in its previous 2009-2010 season agreement. That agreement only allowed ESPN to televise the matches on ESPN2. For the 2010-13 seasons, it’s likely that the games will also be available on ESPN3.com in addition to ESPN2.

The sources added that the time slot ESPN and FSI are negotiating is the early Saturday morning kick-off (and 10am, when there are no 7:45am matches). Some midweek matches may also be included.

The season opener for the 2010-11 Premier League season is Tottenham Hotspur against Manchester City on Saturday, August 14th at 7:45am. While a deal between ESPN and Fox has not yet been finalized, here is the tentative Premier League TV schedule for viewers in the United States.

After Sunday’s World Cup Final, many soccer fans will be jonesing for more games to watch before the Premier League season kicks off again on August 14. But thankfully, there are quite a few summer preseason friendlies featuring European teams that you’ll be able to watch on US television.

Here’s the schedule of games thus far (all times Eastern):

• Friday, July 16: Celtic v Man United, ESPN2, 7pm
• Saturday, July 17: San Jose Earthquakes v Tottenham Hotspur, ESPN, 4pm
• Wednesday, July 21: Celtic v Sporting, Fox Soccer Channel and FoxSoccer.tv, 8pm
• Wednesday, July 21: Philadelphia Union v Man United, ESPN2 & ESPN3.com, 7:30pm
• Thursday, July 22: NY Red Bulls v Spurs, New York Football Challenge Tournament, Fox Soccer Channel and FoxSoccer.tv, 8.30pm
• Friday, July 23: Man City v Sporting Lisbon, Fox Soccer Channel and FoxSoccer.tv, 8.30pm,
• Sunday, July 25: New York Football Challenge 3rd place match, Fox Soccer Channel + FoxSoccer.tv, 1pm
• Sunday, July 25: New York Football Challenge Final, Fox Soccer Channel + FoxSoccer.tv, 3:30pm
• Sunday, July 25: Kansas City Wizards v Man United, Fox Soccer Channel, 6pm
• Wednesday, July 28: MLS All-Stars v Man United, ESPN3.com and ESPN2, 8.30pm
• Saturday, August 7: LA Galaxy v Real Madrid, Fox Soccer Channel, 10.30pm
• Sunday, August 8: Community Shield, Chelsea v Man United, Fox Soccer Channel, 10am

The list of summer friendlies is definitely not as many as what we saw two years ago when Setanta Sports seemed to be carrying a ton of preseason games. But times have changed. In the coming days to weeks, I expect to see more games added such as the annual Emirates Cup and other tournaments. GolTV usually shows a few friendlies involving European teams also.

Here’s the complete list of preseason friendlies being played by European teams this summer across the United States. And here’s the list of preseason friendlies being played by Premier League clubs around the world.

Out of the above games, which ones are you looking forward to watching the most? And which ones will you be attending in person?

Tottenham Hotspur against Manchester City will kick off the Premier League TV coverage for soccer fans worldwide and in the United States on ESPN2 beginning with the new 2010-11 season on Saturday, August 14.

And now that the Premier League has announced many of the games which will be moved from the traditional 10am ET timeslot, we have a very good idea which games will be on what channels for viewers in the United States.

If, as we presume, Fox Soccer Plus will continue to show the early morning kickoff on Sunday, they’ll have a lot of mouthwatering games between now and the end of the year including Manchester United v Liverpool, Arsenal v Spurs, Everton against Liverpool and many more.

Here is the preliminary TV schedule for viewers in the United States. More games will be added soon. And TV schedules are subject to change (all times Eastern):

Saturday, August 14:
7:45am: Tottenham Hotspur vs Manchester City, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: Chelsea v West Bromwich Albion, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, August 15:
11am: Liverpool v Arsenal, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, August 16:
3pm: Manchester United v Newcastle, TBD

Saturday, August 21:
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
10am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
12:15pm: Wigan Athletic v Chelsea, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, August 22:
8:30am: Newcastle United v Aston Villa, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Fulham v Manchester United, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, August 23:
3pm: Manchester City v Liverpool, TBD

Saturday, August 28:
7:45am: Blackburn Rovers v Arsenal, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: Manchester United v West Ham United, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, August 29:
8:30am: Bolton Wanderers v Birmingham City, Fox Soccer Plus
10am: Sunderland v Manchester City, FoxSoccer.tv
11am: Aston Villa v Everton, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, September 11:
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
10am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2

Sunday, September 12:
8:30am: Everton v Manchester United, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Birmingham City v Liverpool, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, September 13:
3pm: Stoke City v Aston Villa, TBD

Saturday, September 18:
7:45am: Stoke City v West Ham United, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: Sunderland v Arsenal, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, September 19:
8:30am: Manchester United v Liverpool, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Chelsea v Blackburn Rovers, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, September 25:
7:45am: Manchester City v Chelsea, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, September 26:
7am: Bolton v Manchester United, Fox Soccer Plus
9:05am: Wolves v Aston Villa, Fox Soccer Plus
11:10am: Newcastle United v Stoke City, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, October 2:
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
10am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2

Sunday, October 3:
8:30am: Manchester City v Newcastle United, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Chelsea v Arsenal, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, October 4:
3pm: Wigan Athletic v Wolverhampton Wanderers, TBD

Saturday, October 16:
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
10am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
12:30pm: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, October 17:
8:30am: Everton v Liverpool, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Blackpool v Manchester City, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, October 18:
3pm: Blackburn Rovers v Sunderland, TBD

Saturday, October 23:
7:45am: Tottenham Hotspur v Everton, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: West Ham United v Newcastle United, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, October 24:
8:30am: Stoke City v Manchester United, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Manchester City v Arsenal, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, October 30:
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
10am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
12:30pm: Manchester United v Tottenham Hotspur, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, October 31:
7am: Aston Villa v Birmingham, Fox Soccer Plus
8:30am: Bolton v Liverpool, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Newcastle United v Sunderland, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, November 1:
3pm: Blackpool v West Bromwich Albion

Saturday, November  6:
7:45am: Bolton v Tottenham, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)

Sunday, November 7:
8:30am: Arsenal v Newcastle United, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Liverpool v Chelsea, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, November 13:
7:45am: Aston Villa v Manchester United, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: Stoke City v Liverpool, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, November 14:
9am: Everton v Arsenal, Fox Soccer Plus
11:10am: Chelsea v Sunderland, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, November 20:
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
10am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
12:30pm: Liverpool v West Ham United, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, November 21:
8:30am: Arsenal v Tottenham, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Fulham v Manchester City, Fox Soccer Channel

Monday, November 22:
3pm: Sunderland v Everton, TBD

Saturday, November 27:
7:45am: Aston Villa v Arsenal, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)

Sunday, November 28:
8:30am: Newcastle United v Chelsea, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: Tottenham v Liverpool, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, December 4:
7:45am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, December 5:
8:30am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus
11am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, December 11:
7:45am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, December 12:
11am: Wolves v Birmingham, Fox Soccer Channel

Saturday, December 18:
7:45am: TBD v TBD, ESPN2
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, December 19:
7am: West Brom v Wolves, Fox Soccer Channel

Sunday, December 26:
8am: Arsenal v Chelsea, TBD
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel
10am: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Plus (and FoxSoccer.tv)
12:30pm: TBD v TBD, Fox Soccer Channel

What are the games which you are looking forward to? Are you happy with which games are on which channels? Share your opinion in the comment section below.

Does Fox Soccer Channel have a time machine where they’re able to go into the future to find out the results of games, and then report back to present day to reveal the scores? Maybe not, but currently running on Fox Soccer Channel and Fox Soccer Plus is an advertisement promoting Fox Soccer’s new mobile app where they show USA losing to England.

Thanks to EPL Talk reader Eric Dolegowski who took a screenshot from the ad, we can now see that Fox Soccer Channel thinks the US men’s national squad will qualify for the round of 16, but will lose against England (see above picture).

As we approach the last few weeks until we enter one full blissful month of more matches, news and analysis than we can possibly handle, here’s yet another great (free) app for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch that’s worth checking out.

The folks at Fox have released Fox Soccer Ticket to South Africa available in the official App store for free to keep football fans constantly in touch with all the happenings of the World Cup. Featuring elegant design and a smooth, glossy interface, the new Fox Soccer app is sure to be useful during this summer’s tournament. Not unlike ESPN’s Official World Cup app or the Official England app, the Fox Soccer app is a well developed and easy to use application containing all the most recent news, fixtures, and customizable team pages for World Cup fans.

Also featured in the new Fox Soccer app is a photo gallery containing stills of some of world football’s brightest stars that will compete in the tournament. Each gallery of photos sports a different theme of pictures. For example, one thumbnail features info and stills of ten different internationals that represent a country different from where they were born. Brazilian-born Benny Feilhaber who is a US international, Senegal-born France international Patrice Evra and Argentina-born Mexico star Guillermo Franco are all featured. Quite interesting.

Another photo gallery features old photos of memorable World Cup upsets such as Bulgaria over Germany in ’94, Cameroon over Argentina in ’90 and even a great shot of England being upset by the US in 1950.

Make sure you grab the new Fox Soccer app to keep up with all the news this summer. Also, don’t forget to pick up the fantastic EPL Talk app which is also available for free featuring all the best articles, comments and podcast episodes that take place at EPL Talk. Lastly, feel free to share any other great apps that intelligent, like-minded soccer fans can use this summer and in the future to stay connected. Enjoy the football.