TEN late for gold medal leap
TEN missed live coverage of Steve Hooker's gold-medal win in pole vaulting at the Commonwealth Games due to a "faulty cable."
- Published by David Knox
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TEN missed live coverage of Steve Hooker’s gold-medal win in pole vaulting at the Commonwealth Games last night due to a “faulty cable.”
Hooker secured gold at 12:45am AEDT, when England’s Steven Lewis failed in his attempt at the height of 5.70, but TEN’s coverage was delayed by 45 minutes.
TEN’s head of sport David Barham said, ”Ourselves and the BBC had an optical fibre fault from Nehru stadium, and there was nothing we could do about it.
”From my understanding it was about 20 minutes delayed, but we couldn’t do anything.
”This happened before we started (the telecast) when a road fell in and cut the cable back to Australia, so it’s happened before.
“This time there was a fault and the line back to the IBC (International Broadcast Centre) didn’t work.”
But Foxtel broadcast the entire pole vault competition without interruption on one of its six dedicated channels.
One TV Tonight reader noted, “Steve Hooker was about to go for his second jump and TEN lost the feed, went a commercial break and came back saying they still had problems and then went to the table tennis, back again to the studio and then to another commercial, back to the studio and we went to the relay, back to the studio and another commercial break, came back to the studio and was told they’ve got the Foxtel feed of Steve’s jump they showed that and then went to another break, back to the studio and to another relay another commercial break and then finally back to the pole vault.
“It was really a mish mash as if you were able to see it live the English pole vaulter came quite close to beating Steve Hooker. It was annoying as it was the finals.”
TEN isn’t the first Free to Air broadcaster to find the modern audiences frustrated with single channel coverage.
Both Seven at the Beijing Olympics and Nine at the Winter Olympics copped repeated barbs from irate viewers. Some issues are related to the limitations of the anti-siphoning list.
On the weekend Seven also came under fire for not playing all of the Bathurst 1000 live.
Source: Daily Telegraph
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- Tagged with Bathurst 1000, Commonwealth Games, Olympics
20 Responses
Why would TEN delibrately lie about its coverage knowing people could watch it on Foxtel? Dont you think TEN would want to show something like this Live if they could?
Far out the conspiracy theories and the “incompetence” comments that roll off the tongue of so many people here are gross unfair and completely unwarranted. Try working in a pressure job when something happens and see how you handle it? I bet 99 out of the 100 people who complain would crumble.
And its obvious that Fox also have a satellite relay as someone else pointed out, which is why their coverage was able to continue (no one commented in whether it was HD or SD upscale though – seeing as though it was the fibre cable that was to blame)
@Stephen: is anyone who makes a positive comment some kind of “PR” muppet in your eyes? If so, then sign me up…
@ Daniel: that’s mainly the AFL’s fault due to the broadcast agreement with the networks. A game must be a sell out for the Networks to show it live, and even then they need the AFL’s permission to do so.
@Alty: I think their getting Helen and Sandra to “look” at the computer graphic. I agree though…annoying.
Overall really enjoying the first efforts of TEN’s coverage. 2014 will be even better as all rights go to TEN/ONE…not shared with Foxtel or any online partners.
David – Are these first four commenst astroturfing from ten pr?
These things happen. they have still done a great job!!
With live coverage there’s always the potential for technical glitches to occur, even in this day and age. If it was just a technical glitch then Ten shouldn’t be too harshly judged. Seven’s deliberately delayed coverage of Bathurst does however warrant harsh criticism.
They dot his all the time. AFL is a big culprit on seven. They show a Friday night game and have go out by 20 minutes. Why can’ they show live by the second. I mean news is live by the second. Other shows are too! Why is sport so special? :((
Seven did this to Hooker in Beijing too. No technical glitches there, just incompetence.
two things that irritate me about channel 10s coverage
1. They still havnt shown Helen Kapalos where the camera is when she reads the medal tally
2.Their stupid model Stadium in the studio that the camera drops in to
Does anyone know here where Channel 10’s set is? Sydney or Melbourne? Helen Kapalos does Melbourne’s 5pm news, but an hour later turns up on the desk with Bill Woods… Does that mean she’s filiming 5pm news from Sydney? Or is Bill Woods and Sandra Sully etc in Melbourne? It’s very confusing…
Melb Docklands.
The English competitor came no where near close. The English fella had have been vaulting since the start of the competition and reached his limit one vault after Hooker started. Hooker was only just begining, he came in right at the end did two Vaults and.because he had already won the gold did not need to do any more…
Strange that Foxtel had no problems and ten did.
I can understand that technical problems occur, so I do have some sympathies.
However, it couldn’t have been more poorly timed, as people like myself had stayed up so late, just to see that single event and it cut out, then never reappeared in the next 30-50mins.
Foxtel has fibre optic for HD and a SD satellite backup for their 6 channels. Maybe Ten has no backup?
I think this was poorly handled by TEN, as the article says they went back to the athletics to show a relay after the table tennis. The relay said it was live but there was no mention of the pole vault. How can they show live athletics without telling us what we are sitting on the edge of our seats to find out?
People are blaming the networks when it is the government they should be lobbying!!
Seems like BS to me. How did Foxtel manage to show it live?
Is the criticism only coming from the Murdoch media who want to take all the sport off free to air and put it on pay tv?
I’ve found the Ten telecast very enjoyable and well done although there have been some boring periods such as the rugby last night. That has little interest to me as an AFL fan. The cycling has been really good and the stories from the athletics always entertain.
As one of your readers noted and a you mentioned in the article, Ten lost the feed and advised viewers that they were having technical. They did their best they could considering . They didn’t purposely mislead viewers,
If the anti-siphoning was passed already Ten should be able to show different sports on both Ten and One! Seems so silly to have a dedicated sports channel only relaying whats on the main channel.