Post by Teddy Bear on Aug 4, 2012 0:35:28 GMT
One might say, the BBC's 'Limp Pics' 
The BBC's London Olympics 2012 coverage is well short of gold medal standard
By Dan Hodges
There was a sublime moment yesterday evening. As Alan Hansen was in the midst of analysing Team GB’s winning goal against Uruguay, when bedlam erupted behind him. Without missing a beat, BBC presenter Jake Humphrey broke in and coolly informed his audience: “Yes that was a decent ball in from Scott Sinclair, it was a nice take and a nice cross from Joe Allen, and it was a great finish from Daniel Sturridge. But the reason for the round of applause behind me is because this man has emerged onto the BBC balcony.” Cue a fantastic shot of Bradley Wiggins waving to the Olympic Park faithful, followed by one of Humphrey calmly getting up from his seat, grabbing a mike and ditching the football for a quick chin-wag with the man of the hour.
It all made for great television. Which is just as well, because so far moments of great television, as distinct from moments of great sporting prowess, have been thin on the ground.
BBC bashing has become so popular it could almost qualify as an Olympic sport in its own right. And to be honest, I’ve never been an especially keen participant. But to date the BBC’s coverage has been a disappointment.
There haven’t been any disasters. No dramatic moments have been missed. I can’t recall any catastrophic commentary blunders. But the Olympics are a global television event. And the organisation that once prided itself on being the world’s premier sports broadcaster isn’t quite rising to the occasion.
The BBC has had seven years to prepare. But to look at the opening credits you’d think they had less than 7 weeks. When I first saw those grotesque cartoon characters I reacted in much the same way as I imagine the crowd did when catching their first tantalising glimpse of the Emperor's new clothes. They were so staggeringly bad I at first thought they must actually be a work of rare genius; a product of such creative depth that my layman’s brain couldn’t fully comprehend their brilliance. Then I saw Channel 4’s promo for their Paralympic coverage, and the truth finally dawned. The BBC’s credits are an abomination.
There is also the strange deployment of presenters. Clare Balding may have courted controversy when she questioned Ye Shiwen’s superhuman efforts in the pool, but even the most casual viewer of the BBC’s output would swiftly recognise Balding is by a distance the most accomplished member of the senior presenting team. Yet she has been posted out to the aquatic centre.
Meanwhile Gary Lineker has been anointed the new Des. Lineker’s transition from pitch to studio has been impressive, and he had developed into a good, solid presenter. But he doesn’t yet have the weight, nor the expertise, to anchor coverage of this magnitude. And some of his exchanges with Ian Thorpe, the Australian swimming legend, have bordered on the embarrassing.
To be fair to the BBC team, they at times seem unclear whether their brief is to analyse, report or cheerlead. Matt Baker and Christine Still’s enthusiastic coverage during the gymnastics, for example, has certainly been infectious. But at times it has crossed the line from infectious to virulent. During the men’s team final they were so busy emoting over our historic silver they failed to notice the significance of the judges huddling earnestly around their screens, reviewing Japan’s final pommel horse routine. The Japanese appeal was ultimately successful, and Team GB’s silver was downgraded to a bronze.
At times there’s also a strange reticence over breaking the truth about what’s actually going on. “It’s not impossible,” the diving commentators told us as Pete Waterfield and Tom Daly tried to recover from their disastrous fourth dive, when it clearly was. “That’s a good set of scores for Great Britain”, Still announced after one of the early rounds of the women’s team gymnastics; moments later, the standings revealed Britain was languishing in eighth.
In fact the BBC’s inability to explain the obtuse scoring systems in use in many Olympic disciplines is my own personal bugbear. During the showjumping many of us were forced to turn to Twitter to find out what Team GB needed to do, or more pertinently what the Germans needed to knock over, in order to take gold.
There’s no doubt the BBC’s output is comprehensive. But it lacks depth, and is sorely lacking in innovation.
Partly that’s because the world of sports broadcasting has moved on, and the BBC hasn’t moved with it. In the age of digital television nearly every niche sport now benefits from dedicated coverage, and the days when BBC executives could boast “hype up the sound, cut out the boring bits and you’ve got Match of the Day” are long gone. This was cruelly illustrated in the contrast between the ITV’s Tour de France coverage, and the BBC’s coverage of the men’s road race – and the angry public reaction to the latter.
The BBC also continues to suffer from its perennial problem of not quite knowing who its audience is. The Corporation would claim the Olympics are a national event, and its focus is on making coverage accessible not just to non-experts but to people who are not even regular sports enthusiasts. But as we saw from Channel 4’s coverage when it inherited Test cricket, the more intelligent and analytical the output, the more accessible it becomes.
Perhaps the bigger truth is that the BBC is no longer a major sports broadcaster. Too much has now been ceded to the their competitors. And it’s simply unrealistic to expect the BBC to produce cutting-edge Olympic coverage off the back of two weeks of Wimbledon and a major international football tournament once every two years.
I’ll be glued for every day of the next fortnight. And the BBC will continue to do their best. But the sad reality is the BBC’s best is no longer good enough for gold.
By Dan Hodges
There was a sublime moment yesterday evening. As Alan Hansen was in the midst of analysing Team GB’s winning goal against Uruguay, when bedlam erupted behind him. Without missing a beat, BBC presenter Jake Humphrey broke in and coolly informed his audience: “Yes that was a decent ball in from Scott Sinclair, it was a nice take and a nice cross from Joe Allen, and it was a great finish from Daniel Sturridge. But the reason for the round of applause behind me is because this man has emerged onto the BBC balcony.” Cue a fantastic shot of Bradley Wiggins waving to the Olympic Park faithful, followed by one of Humphrey calmly getting up from his seat, grabbing a mike and ditching the football for a quick chin-wag with the man of the hour.
It all made for great television. Which is just as well, because so far moments of great television, as distinct from moments of great sporting prowess, have been thin on the ground.
BBC bashing has become so popular it could almost qualify as an Olympic sport in its own right. And to be honest, I’ve never been an especially keen participant. But to date the BBC’s coverage has been a disappointment.
There haven’t been any disasters. No dramatic moments have been missed. I can’t recall any catastrophic commentary blunders. But the Olympics are a global television event. And the organisation that once prided itself on being the world’s premier sports broadcaster isn’t quite rising to the occasion.
The BBC has had seven years to prepare. But to look at the opening credits you’d think they had less than 7 weeks. When I first saw those grotesque cartoon characters I reacted in much the same way as I imagine the crowd did when catching their first tantalising glimpse of the Emperor's new clothes. They were so staggeringly bad I at first thought they must actually be a work of rare genius; a product of such creative depth that my layman’s brain couldn’t fully comprehend their brilliance. Then I saw Channel 4’s promo for their Paralympic coverage, and the truth finally dawned. The BBC’s credits are an abomination.
There is also the strange deployment of presenters. Clare Balding may have courted controversy when she questioned Ye Shiwen’s superhuman efforts in the pool, but even the most casual viewer of the BBC’s output would swiftly recognise Balding is by a distance the most accomplished member of the senior presenting team. Yet she has been posted out to the aquatic centre.
Meanwhile Gary Lineker has been anointed the new Des. Lineker’s transition from pitch to studio has been impressive, and he had developed into a good, solid presenter. But he doesn’t yet have the weight, nor the expertise, to anchor coverage of this magnitude. And some of his exchanges with Ian Thorpe, the Australian swimming legend, have bordered on the embarrassing.
To be fair to the BBC team, they at times seem unclear whether their brief is to analyse, report or cheerlead. Matt Baker and Christine Still’s enthusiastic coverage during the gymnastics, for example, has certainly been infectious. But at times it has crossed the line from infectious to virulent. During the men’s team final they were so busy emoting over our historic silver they failed to notice the significance of the judges huddling earnestly around their screens, reviewing Japan’s final pommel horse routine. The Japanese appeal was ultimately successful, and Team GB’s silver was downgraded to a bronze.
At times there’s also a strange reticence over breaking the truth about what’s actually going on. “It’s not impossible,” the diving commentators told us as Pete Waterfield and Tom Daly tried to recover from their disastrous fourth dive, when it clearly was. “That’s a good set of scores for Great Britain”, Still announced after one of the early rounds of the women’s team gymnastics; moments later, the standings revealed Britain was languishing in eighth.
In fact the BBC’s inability to explain the obtuse scoring systems in use in many Olympic disciplines is my own personal bugbear. During the showjumping many of us were forced to turn to Twitter to find out what Team GB needed to do, or more pertinently what the Germans needed to knock over, in order to take gold.
There’s no doubt the BBC’s output is comprehensive. But it lacks depth, and is sorely lacking in innovation.
Partly that’s because the world of sports broadcasting has moved on, and the BBC hasn’t moved with it. In the age of digital television nearly every niche sport now benefits from dedicated coverage, and the days when BBC executives could boast “hype up the sound, cut out the boring bits and you’ve got Match of the Day” are long gone. This was cruelly illustrated in the contrast between the ITV’s Tour de France coverage, and the BBC’s coverage of the men’s road race – and the angry public reaction to the latter.
The BBC also continues to suffer from its perennial problem of not quite knowing who its audience is. The Corporation would claim the Olympics are a national event, and its focus is on making coverage accessible not just to non-experts but to people who are not even regular sports enthusiasts. But as we saw from Channel 4’s coverage when it inherited Test cricket, the more intelligent and analytical the output, the more accessible it becomes.
Perhaps the bigger truth is that the BBC is no longer a major sports broadcaster. Too much has now been ceded to the their competitors. And it’s simply unrealistic to expect the BBC to produce cutting-edge Olympic coverage off the back of two weeks of Wimbledon and a major international football tournament once every two years.
I’ll be glued for every day of the next fortnight. And the BBC will continue to do their best. But the sad reality is the BBC’s best is no longer good enough for gold.
