So you love Football, you crave the Premiership but you’re stuck in a country which doesn’t share your interest.  They all seem obsessed with different games, where you don’t even understand the rules!  What can you do?  Where can you keep up to date with all the football action? Well one solution may appear to be the BBC iPlayer, which streams all it’s shows live and archives them to watch later too.   Sure the BBC doesn’t have as many of the bigger sports live any more, due to the ridiculous costs involved but there’s usually lots of coverage and highlight shows.

match of the day live stream

Indeed if you’re a football fan of a lower league club, then BBC radio is a veritable goldmine of entertainment. Almost every game is covered by experienced local broadcasters where you can follow your club’s progress (or lack in the case of mine!).  It’s  a great fix if you’re feeling a little homesick, live coverage of a dour non-league football game on a dark night in February!  Ok so it’s not live TV but the radio broadcasts can be surprisingly atmospheric.

Higher up the football pyramid in the Premier League, there are other options and you can of course, get your fix from Gary Lineker. The BBC has one of the best highlight shows on TV for football and it’s called Match of the Day Streamed live on Saturday night and then usually on Sunday night too with Match of the Day 2, you can actually see every Premiership goal and many hours of coverage.   They don’t get many live games apart from usually the FA Cup matches, but it’s a decent option.  The solution below can also be used to gain access to live matches from Sky and BT but you’ll also need a subscription too.

 Watch Match of the Day Abroad

So can you watch football like this, is it possible to stream MotD all over the planet?

Unfortunately this is where the good news stops, the BBC iPlayer is blocked in all countries outside the United Kingdom. It doesn’t matter who you are, or where you’re from or even if  you’ve paid for a TV licence So under normal circumstances you’ll not be able to watch Match of the Day at all as soon as you leave the country.

How to Watch Match of the Day Abroad

Don’t worry though, there is a simple method to enable you to watch Match of the Day abroad – you simply need to change your IP address.   It’s not difficult, and you don’t need to be a computer expert to do it.  There are lots of programs known as VPN services which basically do all the work for you.  You just install a simple piece of software which sits in your task bar or an app on your phone.  Then by connecting to a UK based VPN server then you’ll have full access to the BBC irrespective of your location. Just watch this video demonstrating how simple it is to watch MotD online.

Just watch the video and you’ll see how easy it is –


Since this video was created, you now do have to create a BBC iPlayer account to login with.  Don’t worry about this though, you just need an email account to create one.  You will be asked if you have a TV license, but there are no checks on this (hint just say ‘yes’).   You are also asked for your postcode, but any valid UK postcode (like a US ZIP code) will do – just pick an address of anywhere in the UK.  Again the iPlayer account is only used to record your viewing preferences and suggest options you might like, so don’t worry about creating one.

Not Just MotD Live – Watch Free TV From All Over the World

In reality you’re not actually changing IP addresses but actually hiding them. The only address which is seen belongs to the VPN server, which means as long as it’s in the right country then you’ll be able to bypass any block. For example if you connect to a UK server then all the British TV channels will be accessible. These are all free so it’s brilliant for an English speaker. Switch to a US server and you can access all the US only media sites. My favorite is an online radio station called Pandora, only available to US listeners normally. You can access pretty much anything anywhere, by just clicking on the right country.

SO give it a try, by using a simple VPN service like Nord VPN you can hide your real IP address and bypass all of the UK only blocks. As soon as you do this, all of the BBC’s online resources are accessible including Match of the Day. There are eleven live channels streaming to watch on the BBC alone, plus thousands of archived shows.

Remember though the licensing rights for Match of the Day are fairly restrictive so you’ll have to be quick.  You can watch live on the BBC when the show is being broadcast (usually around 10:40 PM Saturday).  You can also catch it on the BBC iPlayer archive a couple of days later, but only for a maximum of seven days unlike 12 months for most other content.