Live From FIFA Women's World Cup: Telemundo's Chris Suarez-Meyers on Leveraging Live Production Though benefiting from lessons learned in Qatar, the effort relies more on remote operation By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, August 8, 2023 - 8:44 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The presence Telemundo Deportes has in Australia and New Zealand for the FIFA Women's World Cup is focused on covering all angles of the event, following Team USA while capturing the diverse storylines throughout the host countries. For this tournament, Telemundo's model is a departure from the large-scale studio and production operations it deployed for the 2022 Men's World Cup in Qatar last December. By leveraging live-production capabilities, virtual studios, and personnel back home at Telemundo Center in Miami, the team here is focused on giving its viewers in the U.S. a greater understanding and broader exposure of not only Sydney but all nine host cities that make up the 2023 Women's World Cup.
We are fanned out and have a presence in all nine cities and 10 stadiums, says Chris Suarez-Meyers, SVP, content operations, Telemundo Deportes. We're about a hundred strong in both New Zealand and Australia, rotating around key matchups and national-team movements. By the final week, we'll all converge in Sydney to cover the second Semifinal and Final. The approach puts the emphasis on five ENG crews that don't have reporters attached to them but have hosts.
Chris Suarez-Meyers in Telemundo's area at the World Cup IBC
Telemundo is using LiveU LU800 field units, allowing multiple cameras to be connected in the field to one backpack and sending live content directly to Miami PCRs.
Our teams are jumping around and covering matches but, at the same time, are performing their hosting duties from different cities across both countries, explains Suarez-Meyers. It gives us a little bit more variety in our coverage and a different background every night. But then, at the same time, on match day, they can go in there and perform the normal game-day coverage of both hosting and newsgathering.
All of our ENG crews have a B camera, he continues. If we're not filming a two-camera shoot with multiple talent, we'll point the camera in a different direction and get a scenic shot. It gives us a built-in bump shot from each of our live hits.
The run-and-gun approach and parachuting in an ENG team definitely pushes the limits, given the cadence of Group Stage, distances (and time-zone differences), Suarez-Meyers says, but things are going well, and the plan is going off according to script.
That's in part due to our partners at HBS and FIFA as well as the fact that both countries have hosted major international events before, he adds. They've got the experience, got the expertise, and they know what it's like to deal with visiting media. We're getting a lot of support, which helps make the plan go smoother.
With so much of the operation being back home in Miami (where more than 250 employees are working on it), the broadcaster's presence at the IBC has been scaled back to just engineering.
We worked with BSI in Canada on the design and integration of our facility, which is focused on quality control, the routing of the multi-lateral-feed packages and isos back to Miami, says Suarez-Meyers. In addition to our fiber lines, we use cell-bonded LiveU when we're out on the street and over IP when we're at the stadiums and point it back to Miami.
The Telemundo linear-channel pre-/post-match coverage is not as extensive as it was in Qatar; however, the new FAST Channel recently launched on Peacock is supplementing content leveraging the FIFA Max service.
The FAST Channel requires a constant refresh of content, notes Suarez-Meyers, and that's where we dip into FIFA Max. The number of film crews that HBS has [deployed] to feed that beast acts as a force multiplier for us in terms of manpower. Otherwise, we would have needed an additional 10-12 crews just to cover the teams.
The FIFA Max server helps out even when Telemundo has an ENG team in a city for a match. It's hard to move a crew from, say, their city position in Dunedin to the airport to cover a team arrival or departure, notes Suarez-Meyers. That is where the FIFA Max server helps fill the gap for us.
As the tournament progresses and the match calendar winds down, the Telemundo crews will begin to collaborate more, expand their color assignments, and have the opportunity to cover the excitement and the buildup to the Final. Currently, one team is based in Sydney, two are roving New Zealand, and two are traveling across Australia.
We'll have a little bit of breathing room towards the end, and the crews can go out and get more color and cover the fanfests and other fan events, says Suarez-Meyers. Embedded with our ENG crews are social producers, whose original content complements our broadcast offering.
Telemundo also has one announce team on the ground passing through Australia and New Zealand. Seven-time Emmy Award-winner and the broadcaster's star announcer Andres Cantor leads the in-venue announce team, with analysis by former Mexican National Team and Chivas player Manuel Sol and former U.S. Soccer coach Natalia Astrain. Through Group Stage, the team has announced seven games from venue and will call a total of 12 games by the end of the tournament. Other announcer teams will feature Sammy Sadovnik, Cop n lvarez, Daniella L pez-Guajaro, and Jorge Calvo calling games from Miami.
Telemundo worked with HBS on a special service providing the broadcaster IP access at pitch-side standup positions and at the commentary tribune. This allowed us to create a unilateral comcam, which typically isn't seen at the Women&
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
06/12/2025
In a live broadcast from the Reagan National Defense Forum, L3Harris Chair and CEO Christopher Kubasik joined Morgan Brennan on CNBCs Closing Bell: Overtime. Ku...
06/12/2025
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. A new survey from Pixitmedia by Datacore revealed a major shift in the Media & Entertainment industry in media archiving, with 85% of resp...
06/12/2025
HACKENSACK, N.J. LiveU has announced that the national public broadcaster Czech Television has completed one of the largest LiveU live production deployments fo...
06/12/2025
NEW YORK The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) presented the Excellence in Production Technology Emmy Award to NASA+ and Dr. Tom Leight...
05/12/2025
2025 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame: Curt Gowdy Jr. - Master Storyteller, Nati...
05/12/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Veritone's Sean King on the Power of Mining Video, Audio DataThe company's Data Refinery offers users total control and governance over da...
05/12/2025
Platinum White Paper: Inside the Nashville Predators' Unified, Flexible, Sca...
05/12/2025
Netflix Reaches Agreement To Acquire Warner Bros. Following Planned WBD SplitThe deal does not include WBDs sports assets like TNT Sports (US, UK, LatAm), Euros...
05/12/2025
FOX Sports Returns to Indianapolis for Primetime Broadcast of Big Ten Championsh...
05/12/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: Digital Engagement & Monetization Workshop Tackles the ...
05/12/2025
Atlanta United Lights Up New Emory Healthcare Studio With First Live Broadcast f...
05/12/2025
As Messi Takes the Pitch, MLS, Apple, NEP Roll Out Largest MLS Cup Production Ev...
05/12/2025
ESPN Enters College Football's Most Intense Month With Elevated Workflows fo...
05/12/2025
It's about that time! Awards season is in full swing, and the Film Independe...
05/12/2025
Every year, Spotify Wrapped offers a personalized look back at the audio that defined your year. It's a snapshot of your listening habits, designed to tell ...
05/12/2025
In 2025, Spotify's EQUAL, GLOW, and RADAR programs celebrated women, LGBTQIA , and emerging artists who turned moments into milestones. From breaking record...
05/12/2025
In our latest blog, we explain how Wi-Fi 7 rollouts can drive consumer loyalty with value-add services such as consumer cybersecurity. We also explore how this ...
05/12/2025
LOS ANGELES Netflix announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire the assets of Warner Bros. for $82.7 billion....
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Nielsens Gracenote has launched Gracenote Content Connect, a new ad platform that provides agencies, brands, supply-side platforms (SSPs) and demand-si...
05/12/2025
NEW YORK In an most important update to the workings of deal-based programmatic advertising, IAB Tech Lab has released version 1.0 of its Deals API for public c...
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Pass the turkey. Pass the stuffing. Pass the cranberry sauce. All are common requests of Americans celebrating Thanksgiving Day with family and f...
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Iris, the new cloud-connected camera control platform, has officially launched with features that turn virtually any PTZ camera into a software-connect...
05/12/2025
HOLLYWOOD, Calif. Netflix announced today that it has entered into an agreement to acquire the assets of Warner Bros. for $82.7 billion....
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Iris, the new cloud-connected camera control platform, has officially launched with features that turn virtually any PTZ camera into a software-connect...
05/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has approved AT&T's $1.02 billion acquisition of spectrum from UScellular in a decision that was issued sho...
05/12/2025
The Best Coldplay Songs: 21 Tracks That Shoot for the Stars From Yellow to Viva La Vida, Fix You to Paradise, this playlist goes back to the start.
December ...
05/12/2025
Zafris Lecture Series Brings Nabil Ayers to Berklee The 32nd annual James G. Zafris Distinguished Lecture series was held on Thursday, November 13, with guest...
05/12/2025
Introducing New Perks to Help You Get Even More from LinkedIn Premium Published on Dec 5, 2025 Categories: Company News, Product News
LinkedIn Corporate Co...
05/12/2025
Friday 5 December 2025
A new Game of Thrones Tale: Official trailer for Sky Exc...
05/12/2025
Back to All News
Don Lee, Lee Jin-uk, and Lalisa Manobal to Star in Netflix Act...
05/12/2025
Tis the season of giving once again and this year we've taken our Give Back Fridays' concept and turned it on its head.
In the autumn we were approach...
05/12/2025
Brayden Gogis doesn't remember a time when he wasn't completely fixated on games in all forms. In preschool, when they asked us to dress up as what we ...
05/12/2025
The Grinch steals the spotlight as the theme for The Late Late Toy Show 2025
Tune in tonight at 9:35pm on RT One and worldwide on RT Player
#LateLateToyShow...
05/12/2025
RT Announces New Presenters of Flagship News Programmes
New RT Six One News co-presenter Tommy Meskill
Sarah McInerney & Justin McCarthy join Morning Ir...
04/12/2025
ToolsOnAir Blackmagic Design HyperDeck Event Presets for just:in mac pro 2025 & ...
04/12/2025
ToolsOnAir AJA Ki Pro Event Presets for just:in mac pro 2025 & just:in linux
More Details:Starting with version 5.5, both just:in mac pro and just:in linux sol...
04/12/2025
Wangu Kanuri from Kenya and Godwin Asediba from Ghana are two of this years finalists for Thomsons Young Journalist of the Year Award. The pair are runners-up i...
04/12/2025
SVG Sit-Down: ProximaVision's Claudio Lisman on Why Tethered Drones Could Be...
04/12/2025
SVG Campus Shot Callers: Imry Halevi, Senior Associate Director of Athletics, Co...
04/12/2025
Platinum White Paper: LiveU Lightweight Sports Production: A Step Change in Spor...
04/12/2025
London to Riyadh: DAZN brings the boxing glamour to new production levels for Be...
04/12/2025
Analysis: Paramount bets on the battering ram' with Champions League play By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Tuesday, December 2, 2025 - 10:12
Print ...
04/12/2025
Space City Home Network Launches SCHN DTC App for Astros and RocketsThe Rockets and Astros were previously the lone NBA and MLB teams without a DTC appBy Jason...
04/12/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: Content Workflows Workshop Spotlights Evolution of Spor...
04/12/2025
New Sponsor Spotlight: Geotech's Patrick Wambold On the Unreal Engine Revolu...
04/12/2025
Curt Gowdy Jr. - Master Storyteller, Nationally and RegionallyBy Jason Dachman, Editorial Director, U.S.
Thursday, December 4, 2025 - 1:52 pm
Print This Sto...
04/12/2025
(L-R) Rebecca Lichtenfeld, Mohammadreza Eyni, Sara Khaki, and Judith Helfand att...
04/12/2025
SBS launches Future Frames initiative to support emerging First Nations video ed...
Live From FIFA Women's World Cup: Telemundo's Chris Suarez-Meyers on Leveraging Live Production Though benefiting from lessons learned in Qatar, the effort relies more on remote operation By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
