ITV : irresponsible broadcasting

First topic message reminder :

Whatever the merits of (to my mind trigger-happy) Rolland's decision, the nature of Steve Ryder's summary of the match both at half and full time was inflammatory and inherently biased.

Had the RC gone the other way, would it have been so biased I wonder?

Sorry. But it was stupid especially when there were pubs and clubs serving alcohol up and down the country. It would be interesting to hear how the French and Irish broadcasters dealt with it.

LondonTiger wrote:

Taffineastbourne wrote:Refs are selective in their application of the laws which causes the anst that occured today.

Yes they are. This is in equal part because:

it is impossible to see everything on the pitch from one position (unlike TV with 78 camera angles)
the laws + directives are too complicated
refs are human and make mistakes.


It is however wrong to slate a ref who applied the law correctly.

I agree that they did go a bit OTT.

I've just read a hundred or more posts about this on several different threads.

As I was reading I wanted to reply to half of them but wanted to read all of the posts that had been made while I was away from the PC

There was one post (this thread or another) that said something about Pienaar, Dayglo and Ryder being legends of the game

Just one more indication that some of the people replying here have NFC what they are talking about

I'm sure there will be riots in the streets up and down the country.
I'm going to start collecting rainwater to drink now, for when society crumbles off the back of some poor punditry. How precious are you?

Just watching itv coverage at the moment. They arent saying anything about rules or laws just that it was a shocking/controversial decision . Pienaar is saying the irb are just backing the ref and its about interpretation . He does say it was the letter of the law.

Fitzpatrick and Horan who were in the ground both say they thought it was a red card immediately.

DOD wrote:Just watching itv coverage at the moment. They arent saying anything about rules or laws just that it was a shocking/controversial decision . Pienaar is saying the irb are just backing the ref and its about interpretation . He does say it was the letter of the law.

Fitzpatrick and Horan who were in the ground both say they thought it was a red card immediately.

do you mean Lynagh?

It's a Shame that all of your delicate sensibilities were upset by the pundits, but you do realise you don't have to listen to them? They are not there to give an unbiased opinion, they are there to give THEIR opinion, that us why THEY are there. Otherwise they would have a robot simply recounting the events of the game. Honestly, I've never heard so many people with so little to worry about that they have to get bent out of shape by this. You all must live very charmed lives.
Lots of bitterness and thinly veiled delight about Wales' exit. This represents my last contribution to this forum as it's worse than the old 606, the wums are just more subtle, but the bad feeling is the same.
I'd like to congratulate the founders for their success in getting it up and running, enjoy! HG.

Higher_Ground wrote:It's a Shame that all of your delicate sensibilities were upset by the pundits, but you do realise you don't have to listen to them? They are not there to give an unbiased opinion, they are there to give THEIR opinion, that us why THEY are there. Otherwise they would have a robot simply recounting the events of the game. Honestly, I've never heard so many people with so little to worry about that they have to get bent out of shape by this. You all must live very charmed lives.
Lots of bitterness and thinly veiled delight about Wales' exit. This represents my last contribution to this forum as it's worse than the old 606, the wums are just more subtle, but the bad feeling is the same.
I'd like to congratulate the founders for their success in getting it up and running, enjoy! HG.

There is some truth in what you speak buddy and I felt the same yesterday. But you know what feck em, we still have a great team, there are still some great posters and I'll still be floating around the fringe on here.... Don't let the ankers grind you down.

Ryder is there to be objective. Pienaar, Dallaglio etc are there to explain the rules to those watching and offer some enlightened comment for the masses to understand. they failed to do that and became sensationalist in the extreme. Not once were rules alluded too or mentioned in the initial reporting.

HG no harm but you are taking this personally for no reason whatsoever. Sorry lad but we all have decisions go against us. The Irish had one in the millenium, the scots had one in the pool stages. we all have to just get on with it as that is what makes the game great. it shows you up in a poor light if you cant see past your own anger/bitterness.

Higher_Ground wrote:It's a Shame that all of your delicate sensibilities were upset by the pundits, but you do realise you don't have to listen to them? They are not there to give an unbiased opinion, they are there to give THEIR opinion, that us why THEY are there. Otherwise they would have a robot simply recounting the events of the game. Honestly, I've never heard so many people with so little to worry about that they have to get bent out of shape by this. You all must live very charmed lives.
Lots of bitterness and thinly veiled delight about Wales' exit. This represents my last contribution to this forum as it's worse than the old 606, the wums are just more subtle, but the bad feeling is the same.
I'd like to congratulate the founders for their success in getting it up and running, enjoy! HG.

If you read my post carefully HG, You should notice that I reserved my criticism to essentially the match commentator and the studio anchor Steve Ryder.

The pundits are paid for punditry. The match pundit Michael Owens went off on one in the first half but was much more even-handed in the second half.
And frankly the studio pundits got it all wrong in their criticism.

I did sort of detect the tiniest glimmer of contrition at the outset of today's broadcast in which they skipped over the whole affair in about 30 seconds.

Stand..oops dont know why I said Horan..must be to do with his article after the Irish win.

DOD wrote:Stand..oops dont know why I said Horan..must be to do with his article after the Irish win.

Only reason i mentioned it was that barnes on sky had referenced Horan in agreeing with him regarding rolland getting it wrong yesterday. i was intrigued if he then had changed his tune. Lynagh has for me been the pick of the ITV pundits not least because he behaved with good grace when that Holly Wilaboobie Craig Doyle was being a smug Muppet after the ireland game

That has to be the funniest description of that Muppet Doyle ever.

Just read Barnes in the times and his vilification of roland is quite poor but there you go

If Rolland is on the opposing side from barnes i suspect that will bring him comfort. yeah i love the language filters in this place. I may have to push the boundaries by coming up with new swear words

ITV are probably responsible for a lot of the Welsh fans who still can't get their heads round the fact that rolland called it 100% correctly.

I can't fault the Welsh maybe feeling a tad hard done by, but the ITV panels ignorance of the rules is very poor indeed!

Let's draw a line under it, wales lost, partly due to a lapse in concentration from Warburton and partly due to missing 4 easy kicks!

Just seems dumb that AR is getting the blame for something that Warburton did

What happens to ITV complaints:

Dear Mr [deleted]



Thank you for your email regarding RUGBY WORLD CUP.



I can confirm your complaint has been registered here at ITV Viewer Services.



May I take this opportunity to thank you for taking the time to contact us here at ITV as we always welcome viewer’s feedback.



If we can be of any further assistance please do not hesitate to contact us.



Kind regards



Pat

ITV Viewer Services

In other words... sod off.

I replied

"Is that a complaint registered formally then?

So what's the next stage of the process?"


- I am interested to see how this progresses

COnsider yourselves lucky in Wales we were promised RWC 2011 Wales V France at 08:00, but I was greated to two episodes of 'almost naked animals' at 08:00, and the ITV Wales coverage of the rugby started at 08:30. And after the match we were subjected to Mike Hall doing the best impression of a baby throwing its toys out of the pram I have ever seen. He almost made me feel ashamed to be Welsh.

Portnoy wrote:What happens to ITV complaints:

Dear Mr [deleted]



Thank you for your email regarding RUGBY WORLD CUP.



I can confirm your complaint has been registered here at ITV Viewer Services.



May I take this opportunity to thank you for taking the time to contact us here at ITV as we always welcome viewer’s feedback.



If we can be of any further assistance please do not hesitate to contact us.



Kind regards



Pat

ITV Viewer Services

Aww, I think it's nice that Pat from the Office Sanitation Section took the time to drop you a wee note, Portnoy!!

SS, I've been switching to ITV West for Wales's matches. Why we need a 'Welsh' version of ITV's coverage instead of what the rest of the UK sees is beyond me.

Fracnes Donnovan does make it worth the ITV Wales coverage. But why we get 30mins less build up to OUR semi final I just can't understand.

I used S4C for all of Wales' matches. They had an English commentary service for those who don't understand Welsh I believe (although I stuck to the Welsh option), and it was coverage of the highest standard and whilst obviously pro Wales, was still very balanced in its analysis of the games.

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:
ITV Viewer Services

Aww, I think it's nice that Pat from the Office Sanitation Section took the time to drop you a wee note, Portnoy!! [/quote]

There is of course the easy option of suck it up. Let the broadcasters do what they want.

Fox TV anyone?

I agree with you Dreamer. I usually find the Pro 12 coverage from S4C to be dross (the English commentary I mean) with the general gist being to whinge if the region doesn't do well against whoever they face.

However, I watched 2 RWC matches on S4C and found it very pleasant, very professional and complimented the game very well. The analysis was about the whole match in question and it has brought S4Cs whole rugby coverage up a lot in my estimation.

You should check out S4C's Heineken coverage then Stag, that's very good (although yes it does tend to only focus on the Welsh regions' games it's still very balanced). I think it's worked so well for the rwc because they've brought the best people from Y Clwb Rygbi, and Cwpan Heineken together for it. ITV should take note of it.

Moderato in nillius.

Good to see the mods keeping posts on track,

by providing a good example of rugby coverage, that was balanced and fair and something ITV could learn from to improve their own coverage? Of course.

I'm not a fan of Ryder, but at least he's not Jim Rosenthal.....

rugbydreamer wrote:I used S4C for all of Wales' matches. They had an English commentary service for those who don't understand Welsh I believe (although I stuck to the Welsh option), and it was coverage of the highest standard and whilst obviously pro Wales, was still very balanced in its analysis of the games.

I watched the S4C coverage when I couldn't. Didn't bother with the English commentary either. Not understanding it is better than the other crap that's on

Hi all, been away from the internet for the past few days and not been able to follow everyone’s opinions on The Red Card. I can’t be bothered to read every comment and article on this issue, but just wanted to post part of a comment I made on the Telegraph Blog and this article is as good as any other:


As for the red card, Alain Roland was correct to give it. The letter of the law was adhered to:

10.4 Dangerous Play and Misconduct
(j) Lifting a player from the ground and dropping or driving that player into the ground whilst that player’s feet are still off the ground such that the player’s head and/or upper body come into contact with the ground is dangerous play.
Sanction: Penalty kick

Now the sanctioning for the any foul play is unclear under the laws of the game

10.5 Sanctions
(a) Any player who infringes any part of the Foul Play Law must be admonished, or cautioned and temporarily suspended for a period of ten minutes’ playing time, or sent-off.

However the IRB have said that they wanted to clamp down on this kind of tackle (rightly so), and had a meeting with each countries coaches before the RWC and stated that this kind of tackle would be a red card offence. This isn’t new thinking for the RWC, this has been the view of the IRB for at least a year now.

People say that if you apply the letter of the law to everything in the game then there wouldn’t be a game. This is correct, decisions have to be made and laws interpreted with the “spirit of the game” in mind, otherwise every ruck would end in a penalty.

However this shouldn’t apply to foul play. Foul play, malicious in nature or not, is not in the “spirit of the game”. As for people saying that he shouldn’t have given the decision so early in the match this is nonsense. It makes no difference when the foul play happens. If it did, then you might as well say that for the first 20 minutes of the match each player can go out and intentionally try to injure the opposition, after the first 20 minutes then red cards will be issued.

Finally as for Alain Rolland making his decision quickly and not talking to his assistant referees this is again nonsense. He was in the prefect position to see the tackle and didn’t need help to make his decision.


P.S. As for this article I agree, the ITV coverage was incredibly biased. Can’t believe the comments of the ex-professionals after the game, none of them would have been happy to be tackled like that. They say that he let go of the player, but that doesn’t matter (they need to brush up on the laws). They also say that Warburton was hard done by because he is bigger than Clerc, why does this matter? Does this mean that they think a bigger player is allowed to get away with foul play? Or that if a small player like Clerc did the same tackle to a bigger player then that would be a red card, because he has to put more effort into his foul play? As for the pratt who was commenting during the game he thought a yellow card would be harsh, unbelievable!

Just to keep peeps up-to-date re my complaint with ITV:

reply fro ITV (yesterday)

Many thanks for your e mail in relation to our rugby World Cup coverage.

Steve Rider was certainly not trying to be inflammatory, he was merely engaging the studio guests in a debate about a major turning point in the game. Our studio panel on the night of Wales against France consisted of three men- Lawrence Dallaglio, Francois Pienaar and Martyn Williams with a wealth of rugby knowledge and an in depth understanding of the game. They all agreed it was a bad tackle- Francois said 'a bad tackle yes, a yellow card yes, but a red card no'. They understood the IRB ruling but they argued that referees throughout the tournament had not been consistent with their application of this. We highlighted two other tackles from the tournament [France v Tonga and South Africa v Fiji] that were as bad as Sam Warburton's, but which had not been punished with a red card. Overall I feel that our pundits made the point that the ruling all comes down to a question of the referee's interpretation, which still leaves room for inconsistencies.

The beauty of having pundits such as Lawrence and Francois is that they have strong and passionate views about rugby and it was their opinion that the referee reacted too quickly on the night and got it wrong. The next day in our coverage Michael Lynagh was more sympathetic to the referee- which just goes to show that everyone has different opinions on the matter.

I hope this goes some way to answering your question-thanks for taking the time to write in and I hope you enjoy our coverage of the culmination of the tournament.

Best wishes,

Phil Heslop [ITV Sport]

To which I replied:

So no formal complaint has been registered.

I asked for the formal process to be explained in the original post

ITV.com certainly doesn't easily help explain it.

Or do I have to raise two complaints with Ofcom about each of these issues?


And after receiving no response this morning I mailed this:

Enough of this shelving of the problem.

This afternoon I shall put in a strong complaint about the deviance of ITV re it's opaqueness of its complaints procedure. That has become the priority issue.

I shall also be placing a supplementary complaint about Rider's irresponsible live anchorage comments during and after the game. I made absolutely no comment about the pundits' views.

Not much in that at all portnoy What i would take issue with is his openign statement. I dont think ryder was trying to 'engage debate'. he clearly already had his mind made up. If he was engaging debate he would have quoted the rules and actually played devils advocate.

i didnt see any debate going on.

Or maybe take issue with their collection of clips of "yellow card " offences which were all increased to reds, but that point was conveniently overlooked by ITV.

Tell you what I'll do. Once I've raised my two complaints with Ofcom (one about the opacity of the complaints procedure on ITV.com (technical problem) and the other about Rider (has he changed the spelling of his name during the RWC?) outrageous comments in the FvW QFs, I'll give you the references to pile in.

Always thought it was spelt with a Y. Cheers Portnoy

Ha ha cracker Portnoy great stuff! Fair play for putting in a complaint.

Ok. The opacity of registering a complaint about ITV.com complaints procedure is on first speak with their call handler is outside Ofcom's remit (I'll return to that).

I am now going to register another 'formal' complaint with ITV through their own call handler's suggestion via another e-mail address.

No doubt more is to follow...

rugbydreamer wrote:I used S4C for all of Wales' matches. They had an English commentary service for those who don't understand Welsh I believe (although I stuck to the Welsh option), and it was coverage of the highest standard and whilst obviously pro Wales, was still very balanced in its analysis of the games.

A World Cup and 3 Finals

you gotta love that pseudonym, maybe I should change mine to, "Two finals, Two Cups"

Or in short TFTC

But then again Biltongbek has become such a globally recognised "Brand" it is impossible to change it now.

A World Cup and 3 Finals wrote:

rugbydreamer wrote:I used S4C for all of Wales' matches. They had an English commentary service for those who don't understand Welsh I believe (although I stuck to the Welsh option), and it was coverage of the highest standard and whilst obviously pro Wales, was still very balanced in its analysis of the games.

You have added greatly to this discussion.

biltongbek wrote:But then again Biltongbek has become such a globally recognised "Brand" it is impossible to change it now.

maybe even a "Brand" that could one day DOMINATE.

also, Portnoy, I commend what you're doing! I think ITV's coverage was one of influential factors in some peoples mis-placed "it wasnt a red card" argument. Factually, incorrect time and time again.

From a customer service perspective, thats a shocking complaints procedure, my company go completely OTT in dealing with complaints and ensuring the complainee is happy within 48 hours max. To see ITV's service in comparison is almost unheard of.

Go Portnoy, go until you see the bright light at the end of the tunnel!

Seems I missed something. I watched in the US and had the NZ broadcast. They covered it well.

I heard other people mentiom the ITV broadcast is less than favourable tones. What happened?

I think ITV has been so bad i have taken to putting up with George Hook on RTE.

doctor_grey wrote:Seems I missed something. I watched in the US and had the NZ broadcast. They covered it well.

I heard other people mentiom the ITV broadcast is less than favourable tones. What happened?

I'm not sure if they'll have removed any bits of the program that were most damning, but it's probably easier to watch it on the ITV website (where you can watch the full match programme).

Generally though, it was a massive 2 fingers up to Rolland and France and screaming "we woz robbed" on behalf of the welsh. Completely biased and factually incorrect statements made repeatedly by nearly everyone on the show at the time. I think they're mainly to blame for the indoctrination of the general rugby public in the UK that it was never a red card and the ref got it horribly wrong.

Latest on the ITV.com front

"Dear Mr [],



Thank you for your further email.

In line with our standard process, your complaint has been registered and logged with ITV, and details will be made available to senior editorial management within ITV. In this instance, we passed your complaint on to the producers of ITV’s Rugby World Cup coverage and the editor of this programme, Phil Heslop, has personally responded to your complaint in detail.

I hope this reassures you of the process in place, but if you feel the response is unsatisfactory you can contact Ofcom via www.ofcom.org.uk

Kind regards

Sue

ITV Viewer Services
"

to which I replied:

"Noted.

Could I expect I mail back from the ITV RWC producer/editor and Rider himself?

I would expect an apology about the outrageous partiality of Riders' comments not only to me but broadcast in tomorrow's 3rd-place final (to be repeated at half-time).

The man was totally out of his depth and whatever the studio pundits said, there are millions of us out here that know the Laws of RU. So the man must apologise.

Please advise me as to the ITV complaints reference number/code on this matter."

What really is the issue here with all you PC lot, go on, what really is the issue,? Surely you lot are not aggrieved to the extent and manner that you are proclaiming here because of Steve Ryders comments - What really is eating at you guys? it really intrigues me. Most of the welsh who feel wronged have moved on. What are you lot still babbling on about and why, why ! - Do you all feel that aggrieved and cheated because of someone's comments after the game - Why PC people, Why?

And with attitudes like that: why do people keep on getting shat upon?

Way to go Ruby is to
a. suck it up?
or
b. stand up to your principles

I resent the fact he is probably on a 6 figure salary and has no clue about the laws of the game he is covering Ruby. Nothing to do with wales. Call me bitter but.....