ITV get rights to cover TdF live

SCR Pedro

Monty Dog wrote:

What makes the Eurosport commentary so much better is the fact that they acknowledge that there are most than just the anglophone riders in the race and their reading of the race tactics is just so much better.

+1

There was a highlights package on last week. Anyone would think that Cavendish & Evans were the only people in the race.

The whole 'Denny Menchov' thing just annoyed the hell out of me too. Overall, it's good to see cycling getting more exposure, but I won't be trading in Eurosport for ITV.

Pedro

peanut

what drives me up the wall with ITV's coverage is their simplistic patronising explanation about bikes , gear and riding techniques and bloody tourist info etc. Its obviously aimed at occasional viewers which are a tiny minority and actually waste 2/3rds of the coverage time which is short enough as it is.
6 hours riding crammed into 15 minutes frenetic camera editing .
I'd rather put up with Duffers :roll:

Gazzetta67

Agree !!! Paul Sherwin started that bloody annoying stuff DENNY ??menchov and
SAMMY sanchez. BIG Beefy Boy Hincapie. Team LEEKYGAS ??? For Flux sake.
i had to turn off and watch the re-runs on Eurosport....the ITV coverage is so Pro USA its unreal as their voice overs and coverage is used by american tv.....like i said before its a race to see who needs a Scraper for their Pants for the amount of times they mention BIG TEX and TEAM ASTANA ???

leguape

peanut wrote:

what drives me up the wall with ITV's coverage is their simplistic patronising explanation about bikes , gear and riding techniques and bloody tourist info etc. Its obviously aimed at occasional viewers which are a tiny minority and actually waste 2/3rds of the coverage time which is short enough as it is.
6 hours riding crammed into 15 minutes frenetic camera editing .
I'd rather put up with Duffers :roll:

Er, that's actually the majority of the audience, always has been. TDF is an "event" which relies largely on that "occasional" viewer for their figures. Always has been, always will be, same as Wimbledon, Ascot and the Olympics to name a few of the other big ones in the annual calendar. do you really think all those people who came out on the roads of London and Kent were bike nuts? No, they weren't, they were people there to see a spectacle and who couldn't have given a fig who won the stage.

Why do you think local authorities in France spend hundreds of thousands of Euros on having a stage pass through their region? For the benefit of a few bike nerds? Get over yourself, it's for the tourist dollar and promotion of their region and its produce.

afx237vi

Which is exactly why a lot of people prefer Eurosport.

ITV = Would rather please advertisers
Eurosport = Only has about 3 advertisers anyway so just shows bike racing

Yes, ITV caters to the casual fan, but bike racing is not exactly the complex of sports. First person from A to B in shortest amount of time and all that. The stupid inserts and viewers questions are not needed.

If someone tunes in because the race went through their town, then fine, they ain't going to want to see Ned Boulting explain what an echelon is.

You don't get Sue Barker explaining how a tie break works when Wimbledon is on. The only way to get interested and learn about a sport is by watching it.

leguape

afx237vi wrote:

Which is exactly why a lot of people prefer Eurosport.

ITV = Would rather please advertisers
Eurosport = Only has about 3 advertisers anyway so just shows bike racing

Yes, ITV caters to the casual fan, but bike racing is not exactly the complex of sports. First person from A to B in shortest amount of time and all that. The stupid inserts and viewers questions are not needed.

If someone tunes in because the race went through their town, then fine, they ain't going to want to see Ned Boulting explain what an echelon is.

You don't get Sue Barker explaining how a tie break works when Wimbledon is on. The only way to get interested and learn about a sport is by watching it.

Nope you are wrong. There's hundreds (well probably several dozen) of VT inserts shot and shown over Wimbledon fortnight covering everything from how Hawkeye works to the racquet stringers, ballboys/girls and looking at every aspect from the fans on the Hill to the people flogging strawberries.

As for bike racing not being complex, well clearly it is as a team sport otherwise people wouldn't get shelled in crosswinds when one team decides to ride an echelon, every break should logically stay away and sprints would be simple cavalry charges. As for getting caught on the wrong side of a crash, domestiques, different types of rider and all that...

afx237vi

The main difference being that the tennis-for-dummies VT inserts at Wimbledon are saved for rain delays are not shown in place of the actual tennis.

And yes, road cycling has different levels of complexity, but you only get to learn about them if they don't distract from the actual race. Ned Boulting telling people about echelons is kinda pointless if they have to chop out an extra 5 minutes of the race to tell us about them.

leguape

afx237vi wrote:

The main difference being that the tennis-for-dummies VT inserts at Wimbledon are saved for rain delays are not shown in place of the actual tennis.

And yes, road cycling has different levels of complexity, but you only get to learn about them if they don't distract from the actual race. Ned Boulting telling people about echelons is kinda pointless if they have to chop out an extra 5 minutes of the race to tell us about them.

Sorry but you are talking piffle. The tennis VTs are run in any of the following: before play starts, at the end of play and when they are doing round the courts mid-afternoon between big show court matches when not much else is happening. Verbal explainers are also run in commentary, in between sets, during hawkeye, on action replays and challenges. This year was full of verbals explaining how the challenge system worked as it was a new feature on the show courts IIRC. Next year there will be VTs about the new Court 2 run in the first few days as it's new.

The only time they've run VTs about echelons is when it has had an obvious effect on the racing or could potentially do so. It would be a bloody short watch without them as most days the reality is that there is very little action. Oh hang on we missed another 30 seconds of the GT contenders looking at each other. Big woop.

afx237vi

leguape wrote:

afx237vi wrote:

The main difference being that the tennis-for-dummies VT inserts at Wimbledon are saved for rain delays are not shown in place of the actual tennis.

And yes, road cycling has different levels of complexity, but you only get to learn about them if they don't distract from the actual race. Ned Boulting telling people about echelons is kinda pointless if they have to chop out an extra 5 minutes of the race to tell us about them.

Sorry but you are talking piffle. The tennis VTs are run in any of the following: before play starts, at the end of play and when they are doing round the courts mid-afternoon between big show court matches when not much else is happening. Verbal explainers are also run in commentary, in between sets, during hawkeye, on action replays and challenges. This year was full of verbals explaining how the challenge system worked as it was a new feature on the show courts IIRC. Next year there will be VTs about the new Court 2 run in the first few days as it's new.

Yes, exactly... ie, not when the tennis is on.

[/quote]The only time they've run VTs about echelons is when it has had an obvious effect on the racing or could potentially do so. It would be a bloody short watch without them as most days the reality is that there is very little action. Oh hang on we missed another 30 seconds of the GT contenders looking at each other. Big woop.[/quote]

Now you're talking piffle. Match of the Day? What's the point of showing anything but the goals? Everything else is just blokes passing the ball about. Big woop. Let's spend 10 minutes showing the football and fill the rest of it up with pointless films explaining how substitutions work.

I think we'll just have to disagree. You don't mind Ned Boulting explaining things you already know, I'd rather watch the race. Fine.

rb1956

tarquin_foxglove wrote:

I'm hoping for a few technical innovations soon to liven up the coverage. Helmet cams would be a good start.

Heh... How about wireless blood-shunts so TV can display a graph of each riders' steroid, EPO and hematocrit levels...

pottssteve

Does anyone know if the Tour Down Under will be on EurospoilSport? If so, will it be on in Asia Pacific? (I'm hoping someone who works there is reading.... )
Cheers

afx237vi

pottssteve wrote:

Does anyone know if the Tour Down Under will be on EurospoilSport? If so, will it be on in Asia Pacific? (I'm hoping someone who works there is reading.... )
Cheers

Sky Sports here in the UK.

knedlicky

Gazzetta67 wrote:

Agree !!! Paul Sherwin started that bloody annoying stuff DENNY ??menchov and SAMMY sanchez. BIG Beefy Boy Hincapie. Team LEEKYGAS ??? For Flux sake.
i had to turn off and watch the re-runs on Eurosport....

Paul Sherwen is from (near) Liverpool and this linguistic feature, more or less particular to only Scouse, is called ‘prosodically-conditioned morphological truncation’.
Thus in Scouse, ‘ozzie’ for hospital. ‘lecky’ for electric, and so on.

Similarly, it's a wonder Phil Liggett (also from near Liverpool) has never come out with “Cavvy is de beesknees sprintee” or “On de brew, Contee made a breakee”.

Think yourself lucky Joey McLaughlin never turned TV commie!

nferrar

I always fall asleep trying to watch a whole stage live but it certainly looks a whole lot better (when I'm awake) in HD. For the key stages (big mountains + TTs) I generally try an d watch Eurosport and then watch the ITV highlights for the other days. Both sets of commentators are pretty annoying IMO but then you're bound to say a lot of crap if you're talking for 4-6 hours about a bunch of guys cycling along a road

andyrac

knedlicky wrote:

Gazzetta67 wrote:

Agree !!! Paul Sherwin started that bloody annoying stuff DENNY ??menchov and SAMMY sanchez. BIG Beefy Boy Hincapie. Team LEEKYGAS ??? For Flux sake.
i had to turn off and watch the re-runs on Eurosport....

Paul Sherwen is from (near) Liverpool and this linguistic feature, more or less particular to only Scouse, is called ‘prosodically-conditioned morphological truncation’.
Thus in Scouse, ‘ozzie’ for hospital. ‘lecky’ for electric, and so on.

Similarly, it's a wonder Phil Liggett (also from near Liverpool) has never come out with “Cavvy is de beesknees sprintee” or “On de brew, Contee made a breakee”.

Think yourself lucky Joey McLaughlin never turned TV commie!

I think they are both from the Wirral - which is thought of as the 'posh' or 'refined' part of Merseyside. Though just because you come from this area doesn't mean you can't speak grammatically correct English.

jimmythecuckoo

SCR Pedro wrote:

Monty Dog wrote:

What makes the Eurosport commentary so much better is the fact that they acknowledge that there are most than just the anglophone riders in the race and their reading of the race tactics is just so much better.

+1
The whole 'Denny Menchov' thing just annoyed the hell out of me too. Overall, it's good to see cycling getting more exposure, but I won't be trading in Eurosport for ITV.

Pedro

Absolutely. The only thing that saves the ITV coverage is Gary Imlach and he isn't as funny as James Richardson was.

Liggett and Sherwen have gone on too long now and it is time for a change.

Eurosport wins it for me hands down.

dave_1

Lig and Sherwin were decent and sometimes funny commentators ...main problem is they were cheerleaders for some of the biggest dopers in sport, unwittingly or not... certainly there job is definitely NOT to give cycling doping headlines so in that respect nobody has any right to criticise them...leave that to people like kimmage. Lig and Sherwin are trying to keep the sport alive, not tell the world they are all doped

Moomaloid

the main prob with them is that they've repeated the same lines for every single situation for the past century! U can almost forecast every single word... I used to love Big Phil, and still do, but yes i'm afraid it is time to move on now....

Kléber

All sports commentators end up like this. Murray Walker, Jon Motson etc...

dave_1

am not so bothered by them repeating the same catch phrases etc..endearing in some respects , their trademark...but they adore the top guys too much...they need not make out they are great mates of so and so, and that so and is a good guy etc...Phil, Paul..treat them all equally pls

moray_gub

Kléber wrote:

All sports commentators end up like this. Murray Walker, Jon Motson etc...

That true the great David Coleman thef football commentator used to say wuuunnn nil every time the first goal was scored.

MG

Cycling Dave

I haven't looked at the rest of the posts, but how cana anyone prefer Eurosport commentary to ITV4?

Ligget and Sherwen are professionals and to the point. Listening to whoever the Irish bloke is (sean kelly?) is exhausting, I can't understand him, and I'm good with accents. Also, I have to watch eurosport for a good 20mins before I have any idea what's happening. It's terrible. I'm delighted that ITV4 will be getting more live coverage.

Viva Imlach

Gazzetta67

Whoever is Sean Kelly ???? i suggest you google him or try wikipedia and you will see how great this man was as a cyclist. 4th best cyclist of all time they say... i can understand Sean no problem. he knows how to read a bike race and his input speaks volumes. . Maybe dave your one of these Southern Softies who`s Mummy & Daddy sent you to boarding school to speak the queen's english = No other culture or language counts eh.

blazing_saddles

Monty Dog wrote:

What makes the Eurosport commentary so much better is the fact that they acknowledge that there are most than just the anglophone riders in the race and their reading of the race tactics is just so much better.

That's because there's always been a lot of interaction between DH and a small, but vocal group of enthusiasts who are not slow to point out, when they overdo the anglo-worship.
A case in point: Lance's return led to a real slanging match, including DH, on another forum.
He does say he takes all criticism "on board" and tries to "adapt" his commentary.
The team are aware that many of the regular viewers have a substantial knowledge of the sport, but that they also have to cater for the novice.

Cycling Dave wrote:

whoever the Irish bloke is

Would that be Re-Cycling Dave? :oops:

DYNAMITE!

afx237vi wrote:

DYNAMITE! wrote:

Of course they get lots of things wrong. But the mistakes are part of Phil and Paul's appeal, and errors occur in any walk of life when you're trying to do a decent job. Eurosport's relationship to commentary is a bit like Shakespeare and the proverbial infinite number of monkeys: give them enough time, and they'll eventually talk about what's happening on screen. I just haven't got the patience to wait for them, frankly, and fans of Harmon generally tend to be the ardent fact-hunting types who confuse trivia for knowledge. Not my bag at all, old boy, but you clearly think Harmon's ghoulish enthusiasm for crashes is worth £50 a month, or however much you pay for your subscription.

You're quite right that ITV4's postage-stamp picture was far from adequate, but I was just pointing out that, contrary to what the CW story maintained, the channel has already broadcast live daily coverage. And anyway, Phil and Paul were present whenever I pressed the red button, so I kept the audio on and watched the pictures on the internet. Lovely stuff!

The bit in bold sounds remarkably like what people were saying about David Duffield 5 years ago. Look how that ended up.

Can't say I've ever noticed Harmon's ghoulish enthusiasm for crashes either. Maybe he just spots more that Ligget?

So Duffield was trying to do a decent job, was he? I'd hate to see him do a bad one.

Duffers originally played to the gallery with his ramblings but ended up, to borrow Christopher Hitchens' description of John McCain, on "the frontier of senility", which is hardly applicable to Paul and the Ligg, regardless of what you may think of their style.

Harmon's voice is often louder just after a crash than during a sprint finish, even if the fall is a relatively minor one. OH MY WORD! THERE'S BEEN A CRASH! WHAT ON EARTH IS GOING ON HERE? You've just soiled your chair is what's going on, chum.

I would not dream of interposing myself in your correspondence with legwipe – sorry, leguape – but I am puzzled why you persist in trying to convince yourself that ITV is the more fact-centric of the two. As anyone with a fully-functioning intellect and a half-decent pair of ears knows, Eurosport is on a mission to over-explain. There's that odd little man who rolls his 'r's popping up to reveal how many riders with a 'p' in their name won a particular stage in previous years, Harmon banging on about Pierre Croissant's 43rd place in the Tour de Whogivesatoss, the pointless scrutiny of some HRM readings, and, of course, the interminable hand-wringing discussions about doping. That is not commentary, it is punditry; and it is very, very dull.

micron

As opposed to the endless pants wetting over St Lance and his minions - Liggett and Sherwenn sold out to USDiscatana years ago and really cannot be taken in any way seriously except as cheerleaders for the Kazakh national cycling team. That job they do exceptionally well but commentate on the entire race and show breadth and depth of knowledge of the sport beyond the doings of Team Hogstrong? Give me Kelly and Harmon any day.

afx237vi

DYNAMITE! wrote:

So Duffield was trying to do a decent job, was he? I'd hate to see him do a bad one.

Duffers originally played to the gallery with his ramblings but ended up, to borrow Christopher Hitchens' description of John McCain, on "the frontier of senility", which is hardly applicable to Paul and the Ligg, regardless of what you may think of their style.

You've misunderstood me. My point was that Duffield started off making small, minor errors that people defended because he's a nice guy, been doing the job a long time, and cycling is a difficult sport to commentate on. The small mistakes eventually got more frequent and less minor until he basically became incapable of doing the job he was being paid to do.

Liggett is going the same way. He's becoming less and less familiar with the current crop of riders and makes more mistakes every year. Last year he called Cavendish's 2nd victory as a win for Ciolek and it had to be (very badly) dubbed over for the evening highlights. That's a pretty big mistake. But like Duffield in the past, people are unwilling to hear any criticism about Liggett because he's such a fixture of cycling TV coverage.

As Kléber says, it happens to all sports commentators. Coleman, Motson, Alliss, Murray Walker. They all end up becoming "national institutions" and go on for far too long.

DYNAMITE! wrote:

Harmon's voice is often louder just after a crash than during a sprint finish, even if the fall is a relatively minor one. OH MY WORD! THERE'S BEEN A CRASH! WHAT ON EARTH IS GOING ON HERE? You've just soiled your chair is what's going on, chum.

I would not dream of interposing myself in your correspondence with legwipe – sorry, leguape – but I am puzzled why you persist in trying to convince yourself that ITV is the more fact-centric of the two. As anyone with a fully-functioning intellect and a half-decent pair of ears knows, Eurosport is on a mission to over-explain. There's that odd little man who rolls his 'r's popping up to reveal how many riders with a 'p' in their name won a particular stage in previous years, Harmon banging on about Pierre Croissant's 43rd place in the Tour de Whogivesatoss, the pointless scrutiny of some HRM readings, and, of course, the interminable hand-wringing discussions about doping. That is not commentary, it is punditry; and it is very, very dull.

Eurosport does all that stuff because it has time to fill during the live coverage. ITV has 45 minutes, minus adverts, in which to recap that day's action. Instead, they insert all manner of useless crap like phone-in competitions and viewers questions. I'd rather more cycling.

DYNAMITE!

"Eurosport does all that stuff because it has time to fill during the live coverage." Really? No-one *has* to be dull, old boy. Like all good commentators, Phil and Paul know the value of silence when it's needed.

And in the certainty that I am breaking that golden rule myself, I'll go further. Subsequent events have lessened the significance of this c0ck-up, but Dave Clifton – sorry, David Harmon – missed the moment when Landis was TdF winner on the road. Phil and Paul didn't. Harmon also made exactly the same kind of mistake during a sprint finish as the one you gave – it was a Giro stage, and he called it for Petacchi when it was clearly one of his Fassa Bortolo team-mates.

I guess only time will tell if The Ligg gets as bad as Duffers, but I doubt it. Duffield was on oddity tucked away on a little satellite channel, and a relatively small number of hardcore cycling fans would tune in to watch, regardless of who was commentating. ITV has a bigger, mainstream audience – do you really think it would allow a senile old man to continue commentating and drive their audience away?

Anonymous

No way can you get commentators pleasing every viewer. its a impossibility, theres lots of people watch the TDF with cover a huge spectrum of knowledge of the sport...so phrases from any commentator can be 'insulting' to some and 'very informative' to others, must be very difficult.

I try to understand the challenge a Cycling commentator is faced with...yes it should be fairly straight forward to interest the viewer when attacks happen, but what about long flat sections where the peletons just ambling along? thats bound to be tough going?

I enjoy coverage from both DH and SK...Dave Harmon really knows everyone in the peleton I think, hes very astute at picking out riders...SK is like a crystal ball...how many times has he been wrong?...don't know how many times Ive heard DH saying 'looks like the breakaway is going to make it"...only for SK to say "No".......Ive got huge respect for SK.....he really is a legend and when the likes of Eddy Merkcx says "SKs the hardest rider Ive ever seen"...and you look at his results...but hes just so humble with it all...but he has his falts aswell...hes not 'dead exciting'...he starts all his sentences with the phrase...

I also enjoy Ligget & Sherwin....I find these 2 more 'alive and exciting' whilst maybe not being as informative or 'race savvy' as Eurosport, but for me they make viewing the Race very entertainingseems to have a bit more energy....

Re..the post on Christy Anderson...yes, I couldnt listen to that woman, she was bad.

But I do like Gary Imlach....and in 2004 on Eurosport Mike Smith commentated with SK and I really liked his energy....

So I like them all.....for different reasons...

Try and understand how tough it would be to comment on Cycling all the time.

Anonymous

some.....bo........dy...... helllllllllp........me............

can't...............breath.........