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Viewers vent over “murky, substandard” 7TWO match

Just a week after a Wimbledon backlash, sports fans let fly over Manchester / Perth match.

A week after viewers slammed Seven for flipping between Wimbledon matches, the network is again under fire from sports fans.

This time the furore was over a broadcast of a Manchester United v Perth Glory match on 7TWO.

Viewers were unhappy with the “murky” standard definition quality of the broadcast, with some giving up altogether.

TVT reader Sully noted, “Sound is horrible, after coming back from ad break before game started you could hear the commentators (Mel/Dave Davutovic and all) saying ‘um, er, ah, I’m just hearing myself back’… With no one commentating for 10min of dead air while we were left to work out what the pre entertainment was and then straight into the call with Basheer from what sounds like a shoebox room with no atmosphere mics.”

It was a big night of Sport for the network with Wimbledon on the primary channel, plus AFL (on Seven or 7mate, depending on location).

Is it possible adding 7food has stretched Seven’s spectrum too thin and it shows when there are three Live sporting events?

Update: A Manchester United v Leeds United match will air on 7mate on Wednesday night. Fingers crossed there is no repeat….

19 Responses

  1. Update:

    On David’s bandwidth comment: 7HD (Channel 70) had major audio issues last night after 11:15pm in Qld markets with Wimbledon.
    And again tonight in Sydney (but just resolved apparently).

    They’re not having a great fortnight!!!

  2. It’s so challenging when we are so used to crystal clear vision for sport. I don’t quite understand how SBS has two HD channels yet, all the others only have one (except GEM HD for the interim)…

    1. SBS are using MPEG4. Since Alston was determined to rush in with a unique DVB with MPEG2, so older equipment doesn’t always work with MPEG4. Even stuff that says it does MPEG4 may not support all of the picture and sound options now available. Seven launched Flix with MPEG4 then had to revert back to MPEG2 least it cost them a few viewers.

      It could have been done so much better with cheap equipment, better picture and sound, less spectrum used allowing for more 5G services, and an earlier shut down of analogue.

    1. Remote Central has one HD service from each commercial broadcaster. 7Mate Central, 10Bold Central, Imparja 9Gem. The remaining services (7, 7two, 10, 10Peach, Imparja 9, Imparja 9Go) are all SD.

  3. I think the picture quality did improve slightly after a few minutes, but in general the broadcast was abysmal.
    Aside from the woeful start & then dreadful commentary – at the start of the match I thought there must have been some sort of substantial delay, as they weren’t commentating on anything that was happening on the screen – there was also virtually no effect sound coming from the pitch level, camera shots were held too long on the wide shot with no camera on the halfway mark, as is usual in football match coverage. Very disappointing, considering they made so much about Man Utd coming here to Perth.

  4. 7 stations are in general very bad ..the tennis is in UHD on BBC this week ….compared to 72 it is amazing quality. We are being had by 7 . They can do much better. Foxtel is better .

  5. Glad it wasn’t just me who found the sound poor quality. It was very muffled at the start. I know at the stadium the noise from the crowd is very loud. I wouldn’t have minded more shots of the Shed (Perth Glory supporters).

  6. Aw, you make me blush, glad then it wasn’t just me overthinking/overreacting.

    Many questioned whether Basheer et al. during play were calling from a sound studio back in Sydney or Melbourne? Wonder if we can find out. Seven have form, ala 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang (when Basil and everyone were calling events out of 7Sport rooms in Docklands)!

  7. If a public broadcaster (SBS) is moving to have MPEG4 HD only multi channels (Viceland and World Movies) there’s no reason why Seven should be scared of doing it.

    1. Agree 100% It’s this kind of shit that will kill off FTA TV.

      The FTA stations are definitely getting greedy with their spectrum driven by their sales departments claiming more channels will makes more money. Surely no-one is watching 7 food!

  8. Is it possible adding 7food has stretched Seven’s spectrum too thin and it shows when there are three Live sporting events? , Yes , and the main fact is the outdated MPEG2 fornat they still use, are they in fear of losing viewers who still only have SD STB , i dont know.

  9. Totally agree but unless Fox Sports do football now for one off games in secondary channels this type of amateur product will always happen. But the final blow for us was when Man Utd played in a change strip instead of their traditional red shirts, probably says it all ,an insult to their Australian fans. .we turned over back to the NRL.

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