How to Watch African Cup of Nations 2010 in the USA, UK and Australia

Unless you have a ticket to an Angola 2010 game, there are basically three ways to watch the African Cup of Nations 2010. Option One is to watch it on TV. Option Two, you can watch a legal, high quality internet stream. Option Three, you take your chances with a barely legal pirated internet stream. Let’s start with Option One.

1. Watching African Cup of Nations 2010 on Television
The news isn’t great I’m afraid. If you want to watch the Africa Cup of Nations 2010 on American television, it seems the only channel (that I know of) showing the tournament is the Malian channel ORTM, which is only available via certain satellite providers.

In you’re in the UK then the bad news is that the BBC aren’t offering the coverage they offered in 2008 (when games were live on either BBC Three or via the red button). Good news is that British Eurosport are showing games live (also on British Eurosport HD) but you’ll need Sky or Virgin or similar to see it. Basically, it’s not on freeview. The BBC will show both semi-finals and the final live though.

If you’re in Australia, then you’re in luck if you have Setanta. Details of Setanta Australia’s Africa Cup of Nations coverage can be found here.

Now onto Options Two and Three…


2. Paid-For Internet Streams

If you’re in the United States, then you can pay to watch live via MyAfricanFootball.com. It costs $7.20 per game, $28.81 for the Group Stage package, and $21.60 for the Final Stages Package (ie, the knockout rounds). It’s pricey, but it’s legal, reliable and apparently good quality. If you’re outside the USA, be aware that this coverage is unavailable in most European, Middle Eastern and some African countries. More details here.

If you’re in the UK and don’t have Eurosport as part of your television package, then you can watch online fairly cheaply via the Eurosport Player, which will simulcast Eurosport’s coverage online. It’s just £3.99 for a one month pass, which will get you through the 2010 African Cup of Nations. I’ve never tried this service, but suspect it’s reliable.

3. “Other” Internet Streams

After that, it’s all about your semi-legal options. Basically internet streaming. The obvious upside is that these streams are free. The downside is that the quality is sometimes questionable (though sometimes decent) and not always reliable. Beggars can’t be choosers. But if you’re going down this route then I would suggest trying the following links:

Iraqgoals.net – Provides a list of streams for current games. Just click and the stream (usually via justin.tv or similar) will open. Sometimes it’s very watchable, sometimes not.

Atdhe.net – Similar to Iraqgoals.net, but less football focused.