Tokyo Olympics: How to watch women’s soccer

The Tokyo Olympics are set to dominate the sports world from July 23-Aug. 8, and the women’s soccer tournament is likely to be one of the marquee events during the games.

The Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament is actually scheduled to begin prior to the Opening Ceremony on July 21, eventually leading to the Gold Medal match on Aug. 5

The U.S. women’s soccer team, led by Alex Morgan, Carli Lloyd, Tobin Heath and Megan Rapinoe, are the gold medal favorites going into the games, however they are not the most recent gold medal winners; in fact, they were upset by Sweden in quarter finals at the 2016 Rio Olympics (setting up a bit of a revenge game with an early matchup). Germany won gold in 2016, but they did not qualify for the Tokyo Olympics.

The other countries taking part in the Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament includes Great Britain, Canada, Japan, Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden and Zambia.

The initial matchups are broken into groups. Group E consists of Japan, Canada, Great Britain and Chile; Group F is China, Brazil, Zambia and the Netherlands; and Group G feature U.S., Sweden, Australia and New Zealand.

Let’s take a look at the full schedule for the women’s soccer tournament and how to watch all the games below. Plus, here's a guide on how to watch all of the Tokyo Olympics.

Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament schedule

July 21

Great Britain 2, Chile 0
Brazil 5, China 0
Sweden 3, United States 0
Canada 1, Japan 1, draw
Netherlands 10, Zambia 3
Australia 2, New Zealand 1

July 24

United States 6, New Zealand 1
Netherlands 3, Brazil 3
Great Britain 1, Japan 0
Sweden 4, Australia 2
China 4, Zambia 4
Canada 2, Chile 1

July 27

Netherlands 8, China 2
Brazil 1, Zambia 0
Japan 1, Chile 0
Great Britain 1, Canada 1, draw
United States 0, Australia 0, draw
Sweden 2, New Zealand 0

July 30

Canada 0 (4), Brazil 0 (3)
Australia 4, Great Britain 3
Sweden 3,  Japan 1
United States 2 (4), the Netherlands 2 (2)

Aug. 2

Canada 1, United States 0
Sweden 1, Australia 0 

Aug. 5

Bronze Medal Match: United States 4, Australia 3

Aug. 6

Gold Medal Match: Canada 1 (3), Sweden 1 (2)

How to watch Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament in the U.S. 

For U.S. audiences, the entirety of the Tokyo Olympics coverage will play out on NBC’s slate of networks.

Most of the women’s tournament will take place on one of three of NBC’s cable channels — NBCSN, USA and The Olympic Channel. NBCSN, USA and The Olympics Channel are all available through certain cable packages, as well as on vMVPD services, including YouTube TV, Fubo TV, Hulu with Live TV, Sling TV. Both YouTube TV and Fubo TV will offer 4K coverage of the Olympics.

In addition, viewers who subscribe to these channels through any of these means can also watch the matches online via NBCSports.com or the NBC Sports app. 

For the gold medal match, that will be broadcast on local NBC stations, which is available for anyone with an antenna, a basic cable subscription or is signed up for YouTube TV, Fubo TV, Hulu with Live TV or Sling TV.

In addition, NBC is offering plenty of Olympics content on its Peacock streaming service. This will include full event replays of different sports. These replays will be available with Peacock’s free, ad-supported tier. Peacock Premium will only be needed for live coverage of the Olympics basketball tournament. 

How to watch Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament in the U.K. 

The BBC is carrying more than 350 hours of live Tokyo Olympic coverage, including many of the women’s football tournament matchups. The matches will be split amongst BBC One, BBC Two, Eurosport, Eurosport Player, BBC iPlayer and BBC Red Button. 

The July 21 matches all have set times and channels, which are:

Great Britain vs. Chile, 8:30 a.m. GMT, BBC Two/Eurosport 1/BBC iPlayer/Eurosport Player
China vs. Brazil, 9 a.m. GMT, Eurosport Player
Sweden vs. U.S., 9:30 a.m. GMT, Eurosport Player
Japan vs. Canada, 11:30 a.m. GMT, Eurosport Player
Netherlands vs. Zambia, 12:00 p.m. GMT, Eurosport 1/Eurosport Player
Australia vs. New Zealand, 12:30 p.m. GMT, Eurosport Player

The only other matches already set on certain channels are the July 24 matches between Great Britain and Japan (11:30 a.m. GMT, BBC Red Button) and Sweden vs. Australia (9:30 a.m. GMT, BBC Red Button).

BBC and BBC iPlayer are available to anyone with a basic U.K. TV license, or on Freeview TV. Eurosport and Eurosport Player, meanwhile, are both premium offerings, with Eurosport Player available in tandem with Discovery Plus for £4.99 per month.

How to watch the Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament in Canada

Canada’s CBC will be the broadcast home for the women’s soccer tournament, while CBC Gem, CBC's dedicated Olympics website and the CBC Olympics app will provide streaming coverage of the games. TSN and Sportsnet are also expected to offer Olympics coverage. 

For Canadian cord-cutters, Sling TV is an option to watch some of the Olympic action without a cable subscription. 

How to watch the Tokyo Olympics women’s soccer tournament from anywhere 

A handy tool for watching content (or a specific broadcast) that may not be available where you or is a virtual private network, or VPN. A VPN routes the network traffic to and from your computer through a specific set of servers in a specific country, allowing for users to watch content on an encrypted feed. 

$12.95 at ExpressVPN

ExpressVPN is one of the easiest and affordable ways to watch what you want from anywhere you want to watch it. Plus it'll help keep your network traffic away from any prying eyes on public networks.

And it's a great way to keep up with all of the action of the Olympics from anywhere in the world.

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