ESPN Reaches Agreement with CONCACAF for W Gold Cup 2024

February 20, 2024

ESPN has reached an agreement with CONCACAF – the Confederation of North America, Central America Caribbean Association Football – to be the exclusive, Spanish-language home of the inaugural W Gold Cup, a new flagship competition for women’s soccer that will showcase eight of the top teams from the Concacaf region and four from South America. ESPN+ will showcase all 28 W Gold Cup matches live and ESPN Deportes will televise 23 games, beginning with the preliminary round on Saturday, February 17, through the final on Sunday, March 10.

All CONCACAF W Gold Cup 2024 matches will air live across ESPN platforms in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The first-ever CONCACAF W Gold Cup is the region’s new premier competition to showcase the best of women’s football. Among the participants are four-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champions the United States, reigning Olympic Gold Medal winners Canada, 2023 Women’s World Cup sides Costa Rica, Panama, and Haiti, plus another five teams from CONCACAF and four invited teams from South America, including 2022 Copa America Femenina winners Brazil, and Argentina and Colombia.

“We are excited to showcase the best of women’s soccer in the Western hemisphere to our Hispanic fans with this new tournament,” says Sonia Gomez, ESPN Senior Director for Programming and Acquisitions. “The three-week competition complements our robust portfolio of women’s sports, reinforcing our leadership role as the definitive home for women’s sports.”

The tournament will feature a six-team preliminary round with three teams advancing to join in a 12-team group stage, followed by a three-round (quarterfinals, semifinals, and final) knockout stage. The final, on Sunday, March 10, will crown Concacaf’s best women’s national team, conclude a cycle of women’s soccer tournaments in the region, and set the stage for those teams participating in the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. The participating teams: Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, *Dominican Republic, *El Salvador, *Guatemala, *Guyana, *Haiti, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, *Puerto Rico, and USA. (* – teams in the preliminary round)

The W Gold Cup will be played across four venues in the United States: Snapdragon Stadium in San Diego, BMO Stadium in Los Angeles, Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, Calif., and Shell Energy Stadium in Houston. The final on March 10 will be at Snapdragon Stadium in San Diego.

ESPN and Women’s Sports:

The W CONCACAF Gold Cup joins ESPN’s unprecedented portfolio of women’s sports that includes the NWSL, the WNBA, Women’s Tennis, NCAA championships – Women’s Basketball Championships, Women’s College World Series, Women’s Volleyball, Women’s College Gymnastics Championship, and more. Through strategic rights acquisitions and programming, ESPN, in over 40 years, has been the driving force connecting fans to women’s sports. In soccer, ESPN’s coverage of the 1999 FIFA Women’s World Cup as host broadcaster and televising all 32 matches live in the U.S. for the first time became a seminal moment for women’s sport globally.

Production:

ESPN Deportes’ event production team led by Rodolfo Martinez, Senior Vice President, international and ESPN Deportes Production. Coordinating Producer Gisela Leyva will helm the production. In addition to live match coverage on ESPN Deportes and ESPN+, the company’s Spanish-language studio programming will provide news and information coverage of the three-week regional soccer competition, led by ESPN Deportes’ Ahora o Nunca with Mauricio Pedroza and Herculez Gomez.

Commentators:

• Julia Headley (play-by-play) and analyst Desirée Monsiváis
• Fernando Palomo (pxp) and analyst Natalia Astrain
• Ruth Carrillo (pxp) and Marissa Lara
• Surround coverage: In addition to live matches on ESPN Deportes and ESPN+, the company’s Spanish-language studio programming such as Ahora o Nunca and SportsCenterwill lead news and information coverage of the competition.