ESPN Deportes to provide multimedia coverage of the 2006 FIFA World Cup.

ESPN Deportes will provide unmatched, daily coverage of the World Cup Thursday, June 8 – Sunday, July 9. World Cup coverage will be available in Spanish via ESPN Deportes television, ESPN Deportes Radio, ESPNdeportes.com and ESPN Deportes La Revista.

The ESPN Deportes World Cup efforts will feature:

— At least 20 reporters (hosts, analysts, guest analysts, contributors) spread throughout Germany

— Cuauhtémoc Blanco, Club America’s forward and arguably the most popular current soccer player in Mexico, will serve as exclusive World Cup reporter for ESPN Deportes Radio throughout the tournament and will appear as a special guest on ESPN Deportes’ studio shows

— Five special daily news and information shows; (62 World Cup SportsCenter editions throughout the tournament)

— Mundial Al Instante (World Cup BottomLine) featuring priority scoring alerts updating viewers on goals as soon as they happen

— Online GameCast of all the matches via ESPNdeportes.com

— SportsCenter: Especial Mundial (5:00 p.m. ET; 11:30 p.m. ET) – Immediately following the final match of the day, ESPN Deportes will present a one-hour special edition of Sports Center: Especial Mundial. The program will include live hits from Germany from ESPN’s traveling studio featuring Ciro Procuna, Daniel “Ruso” Brailovsky and Eduardo Biscayart. The studio will be set up on location for all of the most popular matches. SportsCenter will include in-depth reports of some of the top teams from the Americas – with John Sutcliffe and Dream Job: El Reportero winner Maricio Pedroza following the Mexican National team; Juan Yankilevich and Jorge Barril following Argentina; Jaime Motta covering the U.S.A. and Nicolas Hueto following the footsteps of defending champion Brazil. In addition, Mexican forward Cuauhtémoc Blanco will appear as a special guest on SportsCenter on Friday, June 9 and Saturday, June 10 – the same day Mexico opens Group D against Iran. He will also serve a! s guest analyst on studio shows Alemania al Dia and Futbol Picante: El Tri en Alemania, call in to ESPN Deportes Radio and will participate on chats on ESPNdeportes.com.

— Fuera de Juego: Edicion Mundial (6:00 p.m. ET) – Daily 30-minute round table discussion program featuring World Cup legend Mario Kempes and journalists Randy Alvarez and Martin Ainstein with contributions from Germany from former soccer player Quique Wolff, former Mexican soccer player and coach Daniel Brailovsky, journalists Eduardo Biscayart and Ciro Procuna.

— Alemania al Dia (6:30 p.m. ET) – Hosted by Fernando Palomo, this news program will recap the day’s news from Germany with a nightly special guest from around the world of soccer. Thursday’s guest will be 1986 Mexican World Cup star Fernando Quirarte.

— Futbol Picante: El Tri en Alemania – A one-hour World Cup show devoted to all the news and analysis surrounding the Mexican National team. Futbol Picante: El Tri en Alemania will air the day before and the day of each Mexico match.

ESPNDEPORTES.COM – The leading sports web site for Spanish-speaking fans in Latin American and the U.S. unveiled in a completely re-designed World Cup page. Features include:

— High-quality video clips segments that will include exclusive reports, studio shows and SportsCenter segments via ESPN Motion.

— Enhanced GameCast with real-time data and live commentary for all matches

— Player Ratings, an application which allows users to rate players upon completion of a match and then compares results with other users

— ESPNDeportes.com alerts: The ESPNDeportes.com alerts application updates fans with game-instance action, yellow cards, goals scored and more for World Cup games-in-progress

— Mi ESPN: ESPNDeportes.com introduces personalization to the site, allowing fans to select a preferred team and have related content delivered directly to their customized homepage

— Dedicated reporters covering Team, Argentina, Brazil and Mexico.

— Countdown Clock; photo gallery and fantasy game sponsored by Volkswagen

— Daily chats with ESPN personalities including Mario Kempes, Daniel Brailovsky and Ciro Procuna

— Daily World Cup blogs with journalist Eduardo Biscayart, Vito de Palma and Sebastian Contursi, as well as a look at the World Cup through the eyes of Dream Job winner Mauricio Pedroza.