The former Aston Villa and Whitecaps player joined Mic’d Up to discuss the UCL format, the Prem title race and educating U.S. fans
Nigel Reo-Coker has a unique perspective. Born in London, pushed through the academy systems of English football, before eventually settling in three different long-term stints with Premier League teams, the center midfielder put in the hard yards in one of the game’s more traditional formats. Then, things changed. He moved to MLS and played in America for three years. And now, he’s back, a pundit, analyst and talking head for CBS Sports Golazo Network. Very few of his English peers returned to embed themselves in the U.S. broadcast landscape. Reo-Coker has no regrets, though. Educating new American soccer fans, he feels, is important.
“I think now Americans are really starting to understand it and starting to get deep. It’s only going to be because of different players’ experiences, and how they communicate. My biggest thing I always say to my American fans is: watch the game. When you really watch the game, then you truly understand it,” Reo Coker tells GOAL.
His journey has been an interesting one. For starters, Reo-Coker is a rare English analyst on American television who never represented his country or played consistent European football. His experience in MLS, too, was in the early 2010s, when the league was still in an awkward spot between a niche micro-culture and global relevance.
But in many ways, that makes him singular in his analytical efforts. He has been in MLS and seen it from the outside. He played in the Premier League and watched it from afar. There are some constants here, though. Reo-Coker will remain an Aston Villa loyalist – although he believes the Birmingham club should have a bigger footprint in America. He will also always root for old-fashioned football; it’s why he loves Nottingham Forest this year.
“We always say as ex-players, there’s more than one way to win a football match. You know, what might be palatable to me might not be to you. But at the end of the day, we grew up in a generation and culture about winning, and that will never change in football. So there’s many ways to stimulate conversations from many different points of view,” he says.
And all of that knowledge is being applied on American TV every week. Reo-Coker is a CBS Sports analyst and co-host of The Golazo Show on Paramount+, where he covers football worldwide, ranging from the Champions League to the Premier League. It’s a broad remit, but one he has embraced.
Reo-Coker weighed in on the state of American soccer, the Premier League, and why jeopardy is good for the Champions League in the latest edition of Mic’d Up, a recurring feature in which GOAL US taps into the perspective of broadcasters, analysts, and other pundits on the state of soccer in the U.S. and abroad.
NOTE: This interview has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.
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