On March 5, Darren "IShowSpeed" Watkins Jr was a special guest on the popular CBS show UCL Today, which covers all the action from the UEFA Champions League. This came about after he was invited by football legend Thierry Henry, one of the pundits on the show, during their interaction at the recent Match for Hope 2025.
Joining the American superstar and former Arsenal striker on the star-studded show was host Kate Scott and pundits Jamie Carragher and Micah Richards. At the time of writing, the video uploaded by the CBS Sports Golazo channel on YouTube has amassed nearly a million views.
IShowSpeed also livestreamed his debut on a football-related talk show on a night when Liverpool conquered PSG and Barcelona defeated Benfica. The nearly hour-long broadcast on YouTube reached 200,474 Peak Viewers (PV), making it his channel's most popular upload since the abovementioned Match for Hope 2025, where influencers battled former football stars in an exhibition match aimed at raising money for various charities.
During the UCL Today show, the 20-year-old discussed numerous topics with his hosts, including his obsession with Cristiano Ronaldo. IShowSpeed also spoke about his journey to stardom with Jamie Carragher, with whom he enjoyed a show-long rivalry, and later raced the Liverpool legend, tearing his pants in the process of winning the 40-meter sprint.
If things were not crazy enough at this point (something Speed fans are accustomed to), he had arm-wrestling contests with Carragher, losing convincingly both times. And to end the show of all CBS shows, the Cincinnati, Ohio, native did a patented backflip off the set's large table, much to the delight of the pundits.
With so much going on, this livestream on Speed's YouTube channel ended as one of the most popular across platforms over the past week (not counting YouTube Non-Gaming content). The top two spots went to Pokemon-related channels, which covered the company's 29th-anniversary celebrations and the Pokemon Presents broadcast that revealed quite a lot of news and updates to fans.
Speed's appearance on the CBS post-match UCL show was further proof of the growing importance and influence of content creators across the media and entertainment industries. His appearance will no doubt have raised viewership for the channel, especially when it comes to social media traction.
It won't be surprising if this is the first of many fruitful cameos from the YouTube megastar on UCL Today. Who knows, they might even get him in for a commentary or punditry stint one of these days.
