Football
ESPN staff 7y

MLS games on Sunday garner highest TV ratings in 12 years

Major League Soccer raked in the league's highest TV ratings in 12 years for a pair of games last Sunday.

Nearly 1.3 million viewers watched one of the two games that aired on Fox in different U.S. markets, depending on the NFL game showed on Sept. 18.

Stations that showed an NFL game at 1 p.m. ET broadcast the Toronto FC-New York Red Bulls game at 5 p.m., while stations with a 4 p.m. NFL game aired the Sporting Kansas City-LA Galaxy game at 2 p.m.

Both games ended in draws, with the Galaxy's highlighted by Landon Donovan's first goal since ending his retirement after a year and a half.

The arrangement marked the first time since the MLS debuted in 1996 that a broadcast network aired games from two leagues at the same time.

The Galaxy game also aired on ESPN Deportes, while the Toronto FC game aired on Fox Deportes and on TSN2 in Canada.

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