Once again it was proven if proof were needed that ITV shouldn’t be allowed within a country mile of any live sport.
From 8pm we endured a feisty but not particularly exciting Merseyside FA cup tie and into injury time the only goal of the game went to Everton except we didn’t see it.
Some incompetent had pressed a button and on screen was an advert for BT that after thirty seconds disappeared, we cut back to Goodison and see lots of blue shirted players congratulating each other. Nice one ITV the only goal in almost two hours of football and you managed to miss it.
Add to this the needless studio comments of Andy Townsend minus his sidekick the table, last seen on the side of the pitch at Borussia Dortmund in the Champions league. Steve Ryders’ apology of sorts was not enough, ‘we’re sorry that some of you may have missed the goal due to operational difficulties’.…an operating difficulty? Someone must have been sat reading a paper not realising the game had gone to extra time then pressed the button for an advert.
When Manchester United won the Champions League final in 1999 after being one nil down with three minutes to go ITV went to an ad break immediately the final whistle blew, no scenes of joy for us to witness as United won an unlikely treble. ITV Sport have had ten years and more to get it right but still they cannot even begin to compete with the BBC.
I have been critical of the Beeb especially Messrs Lineker Hansen and Shearer for their unswerving favouritism towards the rich four clubs but I thank my lucky stars that when Pompey won the cup it was on BBC without any adverts unscheduled or otherwise.
Showing posts with label Sport on TV. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sport on TV. Show all posts
Thursday, 5 February 2009
Tuesday, 26 August 2008
Ping-Pong is Coming Home
Ping-Pong coming home? According to Boris Johnson it is, his speech at the Olympic handover party in Beijing was superb, he pointed out that Britain had invented and codified every sport there is and to further strengthen his argument he said "Ping-Pong was invented on the dining tables of England, or wiff-waff as we called it, this is what sets us apart from other nations, where the French saw a dining table they saw the opportunity to have dinner, we looked at a dining table and saw an opportunity to play wiff-waff". "I say to the Chinese People, I say to the world....Ping-Pong is coming home".
With Lord Coe almost in tears and Colin Moynihan behind him barely able to breathe due to hysterical laughter this was exactly what the occasion needed, not some serious speech about funding winners by a politician all too eager to associated himself with our triumphant athletes and surf the wave of goodwill generated by our gold medal winners.
Boris is not the buffoon that some parts of the media portray, he is a highly intelligent, witty and downright straight talking person who knows how to play an audience, lost in admiration for Team GB, Boris mourned the passing of ancient Olympic events such as "The Pancrateon, whose finest exponent was Milo of Kroton, his signature performance was to carry an ox the length of the arena before killing it with his bare hands and devouring it in a single day, I will be asking Lord Coe to bring this event back for 2012".
Maybe that won't be on the 2012 list of events but Badminton will be, did you know that the code of laws and rules of Badminton was drawn up in Southsea? a quite interesting fact, also we all know that Association Football was invented here in England but why can't we have a British football team in the Olympics? With four seperate Football Associations in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and England there are some barriers to us entering a Great Britain football side.
Lets hope it all gets sorted out and hopefully the team will be managed by a character like Harry Redknapp instead of the gum chewing incoherent Alex Ferguson, did you hear his comment when his United team arrived at Fratton Park last night, mumble mumble "rabbit hutch" he said as he walked down to the dressing rooms, sorry Sir Alex not every team has the wealth behind them that a club like United has, Pompey don't have over a hundred million people worldwide and in Surrey claiming to be supporters and all helping to boost the coffers and create a stadium that holds seventy-six thousand people.
The chant of the season so far goes to the Fratton End, last night they silenced the "travelling" United fans with "we support, we support, we support our local team".
Wit and ingenuity.
you can see Boris's speech in full here http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7580165.stm
With Lord Coe almost in tears and Colin Moynihan behind him barely able to breathe due to hysterical laughter this was exactly what the occasion needed, not some serious speech about funding winners by a politician all too eager to associated himself with our triumphant athletes and surf the wave of goodwill generated by our gold medal winners.
Boris is not the buffoon that some parts of the media portray, he is a highly intelligent, witty and downright straight talking person who knows how to play an audience, lost in admiration for Team GB, Boris mourned the passing of ancient Olympic events such as "The Pancrateon, whose finest exponent was Milo of Kroton, his signature performance was to carry an ox the length of the arena before killing it with his bare hands and devouring it in a single day, I will be asking Lord Coe to bring this event back for 2012".
Maybe that won't be on the 2012 list of events but Badminton will be, did you know that the code of laws and rules of Badminton was drawn up in Southsea? a quite interesting fact, also we all know that Association Football was invented here in England but why can't we have a British football team in the Olympics? With four seperate Football Associations in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and England there are some barriers to us entering a Great Britain football side.
Lets hope it all gets sorted out and hopefully the team will be managed by a character like Harry Redknapp instead of the gum chewing incoherent Alex Ferguson, did you hear his comment when his United team arrived at Fratton Park last night, mumble mumble "rabbit hutch" he said as he walked down to the dressing rooms, sorry Sir Alex not every team has the wealth behind them that a club like United has, Pompey don't have over a hundred million people worldwide and in Surrey claiming to be supporters and all helping to boost the coffers and create a stadium that holds seventy-six thousand people.
The chant of the season so far goes to the Fratton End, last night they silenced the "travelling" United fans with "we support, we support, we support our local team".
Wit and ingenuity.
you can see Boris's speech in full here http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7580165.stm
Monday, 18 August 2008
Gold Rush
I am enjoying the Olympics on BBC and thanks to the red button I can get to see everything, although some sports on offer are not exactly my cup of tea I've watched them anyway.
I'm not sure mens beach volleyball has a place on the small screen, ladies yes, it seems quite correct to my one track male mind. What I do object to is dressage, now I've never been an equestrian fan apart from horse racing, you know where you are with racing, start point, finish point, winner and places. But dressage? The commentators, at every opportunity talk about "expression", a horse jigging from one foot to another is deemed to be “expressive”. What, exactly, is being "expressed"? I've logged an hour or so viewing dressage now and I still havn't reached a conclusion.
Rob Walker of the BBC commentary team continues to be a source of pleasure and amusement, he absolutely oozes enthusiasm and eagerness sitting in a tiny rubber dinghy smiling and gripping his microphone as he gets tossed into the air by the swell of the sea as Ben Ainsley streaks by on his way to another gold.
The amount of gold medals we've won has re-ignited my Britishness and to see us winning more gold than Australia is extremely gratifying.
More medals today for Great Britain to follow on from the successes in the cycling, rowing and sailing as well as Lewis Smiths fantastic performance on the pommel horse to get a bronze medal in a gymnastic event, the first in eighty years. I'm hoping maybe we can get some success on the track, Judgment Day is almost here for Christine Ohuruogu. Tomorrow the British runner will line up against the American, Sanya Richards in the 400m, Sarah Claxton runs in the 100m hurdles also Tasha Danvers has got herself in the 400m hurdles final. For the men Marlon Devonish and Christian Malcolm are in the 200m final with Usain Bolt, good luck lads.
A big disappointment has to be Paula Radcliffe, her twenty-third place in the marathon just goes to show that you can't come back a couple of weeks after a stress fracture and expect to win the ultimate Olympic event. But if we were disappointed with lame Paula spare a thought for the Chinese people who are in a state of shock, disbelief and mourning that their golden boy Liu Xiang is out of the games.
He seemed to suffer an injury in his 110m hurdle heat, pulling up almost as he set off. The injury is said to be a ruptured tendon in the foot, he must be a tough cookie, he went back out to the track and took a couple of hurdles and his face showed the pain his frustration overflowed as he kicked his injured foot into a wall inside the stadium. I felt for Liu Xiang, I am currently in plaster myself after rupturing my achilles tendon playing football, if I put any weight on my bad ankle you can hear the scream for miles, this guy must be some kind of superhuman to try and continue in his event.
Xiang won't get another shot at a gold medal until London in 2012 but it seems that Michael Phelps can win medals on a daily basis, therefore I cannot classify him as the greatest ever olympian, I reserve that for Carl Lewis or our own Steven Redgrave.
Hugh Porter the cycling commentator is clearly enjoying himself in the velodrome but a warning for all BBC interviewers here, Rebecca Romero our gold medal winning cyclist was asked for her thoughts after beating fellow Brit Wendy Houvenaghel in the individual pursuit. A four minute slightly cringeworthy rhetoric then ensued where Rebecca talked about demons and the dark side and how she was new to cycling and has such a drive to succeed "I would have been absolutely crushed to have won silver again,” Romero said. “To have medals in two different sports — I’m so proud of myself. It’s been my goal to be a great athlete, to be a great champion".............“If I hadn’t done it today, I don’t know where I would be,” she said. “Probably on the floor, dead somewhere. It’s been so hard, I can’t explain. I was totally believing in myself, but it’s the ultimate.”
glad you asked?
I'm not sure mens beach volleyball has a place on the small screen, ladies yes, it seems quite correct to my one track male mind. What I do object to is dressage, now I've never been an equestrian fan apart from horse racing, you know where you are with racing, start point, finish point, winner and places. But dressage? The commentators, at every opportunity talk about "expression", a horse jigging from one foot to another is deemed to be “expressive”. What, exactly, is being "expressed"? I've logged an hour or so viewing dressage now and I still havn't reached a conclusion.
Rob Walker of the BBC commentary team continues to be a source of pleasure and amusement, he absolutely oozes enthusiasm and eagerness sitting in a tiny rubber dinghy smiling and gripping his microphone as he gets tossed into the air by the swell of the sea as Ben Ainsley streaks by on his way to another gold.
The amount of gold medals we've won has re-ignited my Britishness and to see us winning more gold than Australia is extremely gratifying.
More medals today for Great Britain to follow on from the successes in the cycling, rowing and sailing as well as Lewis Smiths fantastic performance on the pommel horse to get a bronze medal in a gymnastic event, the first in eighty years. I'm hoping maybe we can get some success on the track, Judgment Day is almost here for Christine Ohuruogu. Tomorrow the British runner will line up against the American, Sanya Richards in the 400m, Sarah Claxton runs in the 100m hurdles also Tasha Danvers has got herself in the 400m hurdles final. For the men Marlon Devonish and Christian Malcolm are in the 200m final with Usain Bolt, good luck lads.
A big disappointment has to be Paula Radcliffe, her twenty-third place in the marathon just goes to show that you can't come back a couple of weeks after a stress fracture and expect to win the ultimate Olympic event. But if we were disappointed with lame Paula spare a thought for the Chinese people who are in a state of shock, disbelief and mourning that their golden boy Liu Xiang is out of the games.
He seemed to suffer an injury in his 110m hurdle heat, pulling up almost as he set off. The injury is said to be a ruptured tendon in the foot, he must be a tough cookie, he went back out to the track and took a couple of hurdles and his face showed the pain his frustration overflowed as he kicked his injured foot into a wall inside the stadium. I felt for Liu Xiang, I am currently in plaster myself after rupturing my achilles tendon playing football, if I put any weight on my bad ankle you can hear the scream for miles, this guy must be some kind of superhuman to try and continue in his event.
Xiang won't get another shot at a gold medal until London in 2012 but it seems that Michael Phelps can win medals on a daily basis, therefore I cannot classify him as the greatest ever olympian, I reserve that for Carl Lewis or our own Steven Redgrave.
Hugh Porter the cycling commentator is clearly enjoying himself in the velodrome but a warning for all BBC interviewers here, Rebecca Romero our gold medal winning cyclist was asked for her thoughts after beating fellow Brit Wendy Houvenaghel in the individual pursuit. A four minute slightly cringeworthy rhetoric then ensued where Rebecca talked about demons and the dark side and how she was new to cycling and has such a drive to succeed "I would have been absolutely crushed to have won silver again,” Romero said. “To have medals in two different sports — I’m so proud of myself. It’s been my goal to be a great athlete, to be a great champion".............“If I hadn’t done it today, I don’t know where I would be,” she said. “Probably on the floor, dead somewhere. It’s been so hard, I can’t explain. I was totally believing in myself, but it’s the ultimate.”
glad you asked?
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