RTE's Match Coverage

bucketybuck

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

Jumped the shark?? You seem to have missed the meaning of the phrase as its more to do with idiotic gimmicks!

Actually, its you that seems to have missed the meaning of the phrase.

Jumping the shark is the point in a show where it begins a decline in quality that cant be reversed. In Happy days, when Fonzie jumped the shark it was a nadir that showed viewers that the show was on its way out. At the weekend, although viewers sorta knew the presentation was poor, cutting away from the celebrations was the moment that really highlighted this.

The OP was correct in his use of the term.

Poor_old_gill

Neeson wrote: »

That's fair enough. I'd say even if TV3 had money they'd still fu.ck up.

I suppose showing a little bit of the celebrations is a bit much to ask alright.

Your discussion on this topic is just a combination of a rant and sarcasm!

Look as I said the RTE coverage is better than TV3 but there are usually very obvious reasons for this.

Why is the RTE coverage better?
Much more money and more experience

Why have TV3 got the rights to show the games?
The GAA wanted to diversify onto different channels so as to stop the RTE having a monopoly. Also the RTE may have wanted to reduce its coverage.

What would taking coverage off TV3 mean?
Less games on TV and less exposure for the GAA. Would RTE have changed their schedule twice in 2 weeks to facilitate the qualifiers involving Kilkenny?
It's doubtful and the hurling qualifiers are matches that RTE probably wouldn't have chosen as part of its games package.

How do we rectify this problem?
Give TV3 some of the licence fee and even out the playing field or get the GAA to produce it's on broadcast shows- the TV stations would then air these instead of producing their own output.


What would you suggest happen? Take games off TV3? fine but that means less games on TV

Poor_old_gill

bucketybuck wrote: »

Actually, its you that seems to have missed the meaning of the phrase.

Jumping the shark is the point in a show where it begins a decline in quality that cant be reversed. In Happy days, when Fonzie jumped the shark it was a nadir that showed viewers that the show was on its way out. At the weekend, although viewers sorta knew the presentation was poor, cutting away from the celebrations was the moment that really highlighted this.

The OP was correct in his use of the term.

I think its a question of the context in which the phrase is used- he says that they have jumped the shark by cutting to an ad but that doesn't show a decline in quality- that's just bad luck as the supporters aren't meant to enter the pitch and it would have been a pre-planned break. Something which all stations do, see ITV and the Mourinho interview in last seasons champions league.

I would associate jumping the shark with a station/show engaging in idiotic gimmericky akin to getting the fonze to jump over a shark on his motorcycle and not with a station cutting to a pre planned ad break.

Neeson

Listen I'd love to see more GAA on TV. But because the quality is severely lacking on TV3 they should probably show major games and finals in HD on RTE. Sure the provincial finals were always going to be on TV anyway. On RTE they would be better in every way. If we want extra games then TV3 can have the option of showing these 5pm qualifiers that are never on TV.

The licence fee issue doesn't give an excuse for having someone like Matt Cooper hosting and a weak commentary team. You'd hear better in local radio.

Neeson

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

I think its a question of the context in which the phrase is used- he says that they have jumped the shark by cutting to an ad but that doesn't show a decline in quality- that's just bad luck as the supporters aren't meant to enter the pitch and it would have been a pre-planned break. Something which all stations do, see ITV and the Mourinho interview in last seasons champions league.

I would associate jumping the shark with a station/show engaging in idiotic gimmericky akin to getting the fonze to jump over a shark on his motorcycle and not with a station cutting to a pre planned ad break.

Yeah I was probably wrong. TV3 will never be able to jump the shark or whatever. They were never great to begin with.

The worst they can do now is not bother showing the first 5 minutes of a game or something!

Poor_old_gill

Neeson wrote: »

Listen I'd love to see more GAA on TV. But because the quality is severely lacking on TV3 they should probably show major games and finals in HD on RTE. Sure the provincial finals were always going to be on TV anyway. On RTE they would be better in every way. If we want extra games then TV3 can have the option of showing these 5pm qualifiers that are never on TV.

The licence fee issue doesn't give an excuse for having someone like Matt Cooper hosting and a weak commentary team. You'd hear better in local radio.

Look I agree with you that RTE is better but if you just offer TV3 qualifiers then they will choose not to show anything.

You really have an anti-TV3 agenda though and I am wondering what motivates this as it seems to go beyond caring about seeing Monaghan fans running onto the pitch after a game.

You have these rants about TV3 on several threads but you never offer a credible solution to the problem or any understanding of why one station would be better than another, etc.

Offer a solution- if it's just get RTE to show the games then fine but then that means less games.
If its get TV3 to improve their coverage then fine but give them some of the licence fee/ accept that there will be more ads on during the games.

Is Matt Cooper, who I'd admit isn't great, any worse than Eamon O Hara (who is absolute tripe), Spillane (I'm a Kerryman but god he is painful), Brolly (wind-up merchant) or Whelan (dull as can be)

bucketybuck

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

that's just bad luck as the supporters aren't meant to enter the pitch and it would have been a pre-planned break.

I really disagree with this. Its not bad luck to pre-plan an ad-break immediately following the final whistle in a provincial final, its bad planning, plain and simple. Of course there are going to be celebration scenes immediately following the final whistle, and of course most viewers will want to see the reactions of the players and supporters as they deal with winning or losing.

The five minutes after the final whistle are an emotional whirlwind for those involved, and somebody in TV3 made the concious decision to show an adbreak instead. That speaks volumes.

Poor_old_gill

bucketybuck wrote: »

I really disagree with this. Its not bad luck to pre-plan an ad-break immediately following the final whistle in a provincial final, its bad planning, plain and simple. Of course there are going to be celebration scenes immediately following the final whistle, and of course most viewers will want to see the reactions of the players and supporters as they deal with winning or losing.

The five minutes after the final whistle are an emotional whirlwind for those involved, and somebody in TV3 made the concious decision to show an adbreak instead. That speaks volumes.

Yeah you're right- I agree that it was bad planning

kippy

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

Isn't the problem that TV3 have a very small budget and thus have to cut back on a load of facilities/have long add breaks.
RTE gets the tv licence money and they don't- so the RTE have a much bigger budget.

In an industry based around technology- money makes a massive difference

That's the big difference.
RTE is state and private sector funded and has massive resources to hand, they aint perfect, but they surely have much more to play with.
Brolly and O Hara are pointless however, absolutely useless.

Neeson

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

You really have an anti-TV3 agenda though and I am wondering what motivates this as it seems to go beyond caring about seeing Monaghan fans running onto the pitch after a game.

You have these rants about TV3 on several threads but you never offer a credible solution to the problem or any understanding of why one station would be better than another, etc.

Offer a solution- if it's just get RTE to show the games then fine but then that means less games.
If its get TV3 to improve their coverage then fine but give them some of the licence fee/ accept that there will be more ads on during the games.

Is Matt Cooper, who I'd admit isn't great, any worse than Eamon O Hara (who is absolute tripe), Spillane (I'm a Kerryman but god he is painful), Brolly (wind-up merchant) or Whelan (dull as can be)

Yes. It's more than not just showing the full-time celebrations. It's the whole lacking of quality all over the place. Of course TV3 wouldn't take those games because they wouldn't have viewers and what use would those advertisements be then?

Matt Cooper presents the show. I suppose the analysts on RTE, even though annoying are a bit more articulate and more value but that's probably because they get more than 2 minutes to chat at a time.

roadmaster

In regards to the amount of games being shown. The gaa have full control they reduced the amount that could be shown on tv as they believe it gets more people paying at the gates and bigger profits for them. But by jesus tv3 are shocking on sport weather its football or soccer. I d also even have ur man tommy that does europa league over matt copper doing gaa.

Mars Bar

TV3 shouldn't be allowed near the hurling. Their love of replays from twenty different angles for the least spectacular things would drive ya bonkers.

smashey

I haven't watched a single thing on TV3 in many years as they are crap.

keane2097

TV3 definitely overdo the replays, cutaways to fans/subs/managers and obviously the ads alright. In fairness, I think the replays and cutaways will probably improve as the producers get more experience but the ads are probably here to stay and are a major annoyance.

On another note, I can't believe people compare RTE's commentary and punditry to TV3's favourably. Dara Moloney is the only commentator RTE ever use that doesn't make me physically cringe multiple times per game. The likes of Ger Canning and Marty Morrissey are just awful. Terrible. I know commentary is a hard thing to do - probably much moreso than most people give it credit for - but they say so many blatantly incorrect things every game.

TV3's guy is guilty of trying to inject false drama into games by claiming scores are more important than they are and things like that, but RTE certainly do that as well. In terms of play by play I really don't think you can say TV3 are a lot worse.

As for the colour commentators, I dunno what to say really. McStay is ok, I think he tries to give decent insight at least and I'd probably like him a lot more only for the fact that I find myself disagreeing with him a lot. Complaining that Canavan is too dour without mentioning McStay is deranged.

Speaking of Canavan - he's brilliant. So insightful, understands what's going on in matches at a deep level and puts it across to viewers. Complaining that he doesn't make you feel excited is bizarre. You're watching football, if you need the colour commentator to give you cues on when you're meant to be getting excited maybe try a different sport.

As for the panel, Brolly, Spillane and O'Rourke are terrible. So bad. Brolly spends his entire time weaving flowery descriptions of Ulster teams being machines, it's literally all he does. No insight into why they're machines, how they grind opposition teams into smithereens or suck the life out of them - just the bald assertion that they do it. Thanks Joe.

O'Rourke is meh, never says anything interesting or insightful.

Spillane, much to my amazement, is actually getting a bit better this year. He's still mostly bluster, rubbish and sensationalism, but he must have actually listened to some criticism as he's starting to throw in the odd relevant stat to go along with it this year. He doesn't actually explain why it's relevant or how it illuminates the action on the field yet, but the fact that he's throwing them out now suggests he understands it on some level himself and so there's hope he'll improve.

Ciaran Whelan is ok.

Michael Lyster is pretty terrible. He's like part of the furniture in Irish households at this stage so people don't realise he's terrible but he is. He's maybe worse than Gary Lineker. Asks the worst questions, lets the pundits ramble to oblivion, never pulls them up on any of their absolute bull**** and usually moves off topic immediately on anything starting to sound remotely interesting. He ought to ask better questions and develop the conversation between the pundits, instead he has a list he gives them one each of and moves on when they're done.

Liam Hayes on TV3 is always wrong about everything, and often violently so. Dara genuinely agrees with him to quieten him at times. I think they maybe have him in there hoping he'll do something humorously unpredictable, but the show would improve dramatically if they put someone like David Brady alongside Dara.

Brady can get things wrong at times but at least you can see he thinks a lot about the game and has some interesting ideas on sports science and things that apply well to analysing the modern tactical game. Dara would do better alongside someone other than Hayes a lot more as well. Dara is a brilliant talker and thinker about the game, his piece in the Irish Times is usually good, occasionally brilliant and he has some unreal insights into things that need to get done on the pitch that non-players would never even think about.

I don't really love Senan Connell but I don't really have anything bad to say about him either. Think he's more like the RTE boys in that he sometimes just uses a lot of cliches and doesn't really give any deep reasoning for his opinions. A guy saying "I just think..." a lot in punditry is a very bad thing.

Lastly, the much maligned Matt Cooper. I'm probably in a minority but I'm a big fan of his. I think he suffers from a perception that he's not a sports guy - even though he massively is - due to the Last Word and people were turned off him before he ever started. He's definitely a bit dry but he does everything I mentioned about Lyster above in terms of getting the pundits to say interesting things.

IDK, at the end of all that ramble it's obvious enough that coverage on both RTE and TV3 is pretty bad. There are a tonne of fair grievances about TV3 but giving out about the punditry compared to RTE's is mad. RTE are the worst in any sport maybe ever.

Hitchens

There have been many occasions when RTE only returned after ads when the 2nd half was already in progress.

Who wants to watch a crowd of people running on to a pitch after the match is over?

And who in their right mind wants to hear the aftermatch speeches thanking every Tom, Dick and Harry in the county?

:pac:

Poor_old_gill

keane2097 wrote: »

TV3 definitely overdo the replays, cutaways to fans/subs/managers and obviously the ads alright. In fairness, I think the replays and cutaways will probably improve as the producers get more experience but the ads are probably here to stay and are a major annoyance.

On another note, I can't believe people compare RTE's commentary and punditry to TV3's favourably. Dara Moloney is the only commentator RTE ever use that doesn't make me physically cringe multiple times per game. The likes of Ger Canning and Marty Morrissey are just awful. Terrible. I know commentary is a hard thing to do - probably much moreso than most people give it credit for - but they say so many blatantly incorrect things every game.

TV3's guy is guilty of trying to inject false drama into games by claiming scores are more important than they are and things like that, but RTE certainly do that as well. In terms of play by play I really don't think you can say TV3 are a lot worse.

As for the colour commentators, I dunno what to say really. McStay is ok, I think he tries to give decent insight at least and I'd probably like him a lot more only for the fact that I find myself disagreeing with him a lot. Complaining that Canavan is too dour without mentioning McStay is deranged.

Speaking of Canavan - he's brilliant. So insightful, understands what's going on in matches at a deep level and puts it across to viewers. Complaining that he doesn't make you feel excited is bizarre. You're watching football, if you need the colour commentator to give you cues on when you're meant to be getting excited maybe try a different sport.

As for the panel, Brolly, Spillane and O'Rourke are terrible. So bad. Brolly spends his entire time weaving flowery descriptions of Ulster teams being machines, it's literally all he does. No insight into why they're machines, how they grind opposition teams into smithereens or suck the life out of them - just the bald assertion that they do it. Thanks Joe.

O'Rourke is meh, never says anything interesting or insightful.

Spillane, much to my amazement, is actually getting a bit better this year. He's still mostly bluster, rubbish and sensationalism, but he must have actually listened to some criticism as he's starting to throw in the odd relevant stat to go along with it this year. He doesn't actually explain why it's relevant or how it illuminates the action on the field yet, but the fact that he's throwing them out now suggests he understands it on some level himself and so there's hope he'll improve.

Ciaran Whelan is ok.

Michael Lyster is pretty terrible. He's like part of the furniture in Irish households at this stage so people don't realise he's terrible but he is. He's maybe worse than Gary Lineker. Asks the worst questions, lets the pundits ramble to oblivion, never pulls them up on any of their absolute bull**** and usually moves off topic immediately on anything starting to sound remotely interesting. He ought to ask better questions and develop the conversation between the pundits, instead he has a list he gives them one each of and moves on when they're done.

Liam Hayes on TV3 is always wrong about everything, and often violently so. Dara genuinely agrees with him to quieten him at times. I think they maybe have him in there hoping he'll do something humorously unpredictable, but the show would improve dramatically if they put someone like David Brady alongside Dara.

Brady can get things wrong at times but at least you can see he thinks a lot about the game and has some interesting ideas on sports science and things that apply well to analysing the modern tactical game. Dara would do better alongside someone other than Hayes a lot more as well. Dara is a brilliant talker and thinker about the game, his piece in the Irish Times is usually good, occasionally brilliant and he has some unreal insights into things that need to get done on the pitch that non-players would never even think about.

I don't really love Senan Connell but I don't really have anything bad to say about him either. Think he's more like the RTE boys in that he sometimes just uses a lot of cliches and doesn't really give any deep reasoning for his opinions. A guy saying "I just think..." a lot in punditry is a very bad thing.

Lastly, the much maligned Matt Cooper. I'm probably in a minority but I'm a big fan of his. I think he suffers from a perception that he's not a sports guy - even though he massively is - due to the Last Word and people were turned off him before he ever started. He's definitely a bit dry but he does everything I mentioned about Lyster above in terms of getting the pundits to say interesting things.

IDK, at the end of all that ramble it's obvious enough that coverage on both RTE and TV3 is pretty bad. There are a tonne of fair grievances about TV3 but giving out about the punditry compared to RTE's is mad. RTE are the worst in any sport maybe ever.

A better and more complete analysis of my point!

For all the financial advantages/extra experience that RTE enjoy- they are at best slightly better than TV3 and in some opinions- they are worse

keane2097

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

A better and more complete analysis of my point!

For all the financial advantages/extra experience that RTE enjoy- they are at best slightly better than TV3 and in some opinions- they are worse

They're definitely better in some ways, definitely worse in others.

If you bring the rest of RTE's GAA TV coverage into the argument, i.e. Championship Matters and evening highlights shows, there is no doubt that RTÉ's embarrassingly bad things outweigh TV3's.

My biggest personal rage/facepalm/laugh moment is the way they give us three man of the match nominees every night before cutting to an interview they conducted with the guy they actually picked from hours earlier. WTF is that in aid of?

So much of what goes into the RTE shows is a pure time-wasting effort. Reading out tweets for two minutes. Why, like? I have twitter. Anyone who wants to read tweets can get twitter. Can you please tell me the Christy Ring results? No? What if I tweet them to you?

Warper

RTE is still far better than TV3. The coverage is slicker plus its on HD. TV3, as a channel, is plagued by extremely long and frequent ad breaks. I dont like the set up on TV3 either just standing at the side of the pitch, the whole broadcast looks cheap.

Matt Cooper is so irritable, give me Michael Lyster any day. I like Brolly, cant stand Spillane and O'Rourke is pretty predictable. The hurling coverage far outweighs the football soundbites. Loughnane is great entertainment and Farrell is decent enough. All in all though RTE any day of the week especially for the hurling.

Big Pussy Bonpensiero

People look for entertainment from telly though, and insight is an added bonus, but it's not welcome when it comes at the expense of entertainment.

That's where I think RTE wins hands down. Brolly and Spillane have are entertaining to a lot of people, TV3, however, are boring. Commentators are boring, as well as the pundits. Commentators of RTE may be clichéd, but at least they can add excitement to the game. Also, you can hear the crowd better of RTE games for some reason (which furthermore adds to the excitement), and the picture quality is also much better.

Also, the main reason we watch The Sunday Game, The Sunday Game theme tune.

I like RTE for the entertainment factor, and I don't generally listen to the likes of O' Hara et al, that's why I frequent here and other online forums.

Poor_old_gill

Warper wrote: »

RTE is still far better than TV3. The coverage is slicker plus its on HD. TV3, as a channel, is plagued by extremely long and frequent ad breaks. I dont like the set up on TV3 either just standing at the side of the pitch, the whole broadcast looks cheap.

Matt Cooper is so irritable, give me Michael Lyster any day. I like Brolly, cant stand Spillane and O'Rourke is pretty predictable. The hurling coverage far outweighs the football soundbites. Loughnane is great entertainment and Farrell is decent enough. All in all though RTE any day of the week especially for the hurling.

But the argument about ads and being slicker are just a question of money- TV3 has a limited budget and RTE has the licence fee to mess about with.

Television is a technology based business- RTE can splash out on a whole lot more bells and whistles- yet still they give us O Hara or Brolly.

For the massive advantages that they have- they rarely perform a lot better than TV3

bucketybuck

Hitchens wrote: »

And who in their right mind wants to hear the aftermatch speeches thanking every Tom, Dick and Harry in the county?

:pac:

Personally, I'm not so much interested in the speeches, but I do like to see the immediate reactions of players on the field as they celebrate together. There seems to be a palpable sense of intense joy as they embrace each other, or just fall to their knees in shock, its a good thing to watch.

Its one of the reasons I am glad they are doing away with pitch invasions. There is something joyous about watching the players celebrate together, instead of having to hunch their shoulders and force their way through a bunch of kids and beer bellied yahoos slapping their backs.

Warper

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

But the argument about ads and being slicker are just a question of money- TV3 has a limited budget and RTE has the licence fee to mess about with.

Television is a technology based business- RTE can splash out on a whole lot more bells and whistles- yet still they give us O Hara or Brolly.

For the massive advantages that they have- they rarely perform a lot better than TV3

Question of money or not, RTE are definitely better than TV3. TV3 gives us Hayes, Matt Cooper and Dara O'Se, snore fest.

windy shepard henderson

if its a qustion of money how come tg4 can have up to 3 games covered in diferent parts of the country in the one day ,
they realy push the boat out for lower levels of gaa like the club scene or league games which rte refused to cover as it would cost too much over the years

and they dont need to plague people with 10min adverts!!

68Murph68

The fact of the matter is that TV3 are far worse than both TG4 and Setanta in terms of the quality of their GAA broadcasts.

Whatever about RTE having more cash to work with, I really don't think that either of those are spending much more than TV3 on their GAA broadcasts and their coverage is miles ahead of what TV3 offer up.

The good news is that Setanta has plans to look for more games the next time the contract is up for renewal.

premierstone

windy shepard henderson wrote: »

if its a qustion of money how come tg4 can have up to 3 games covered in diferent parts of the country in the one day ,
they realy push the boat out for lower levels of gaa like the club scene or league games which rte refused to cover as it would cost too much over the years

and they dont need to plague people with 10min adverts!!

TG4 are indeed providing an excellent service with the GAA, but again TG4 is a state funded station which TV3 is not.

Adverts are all a private owned station has for income.

keane2097

The fact that RTÉ has ads at all is pretty bad tbh.

nice_guy80

TG4 coverage is better than either RTE or TV3 and its done on a fraction of the budget

in terms of analysis, commentary, camera replays

and they provide coverage of FAR more games per annum than the other two stations

Hitchens

nice_guy80 wrote: »

TG4 coverage is better

in terms of analysis, commentary,

???????? in a language most GAA followers can't understand!

InchicoreDude

Hitchens wrote: »

???????? in a language most GAA followers can't understand!

Not exactly the fault of TG4 though!

nice_guy80

Hitchens wrote: »

???????? in a language most GAA followers can't understand!

i'd say most GAA followers can understand a lot of it

you pick up the phrases pretty quick after a while