Bitch and Moan

[herc2ules]

Never one to shy away from a good whining session I felt I would air my current football related gripes on this board.
Those of you who live in a football friendly country be thankful you don't have the crappy coverage that exists in Canada (or the US). Anyone who has seen TSN or SportsNet in Canada will know what I mean - although I am thankful that they show any football at all.

But, last weekend as I sat down to get my usual Saturday morning 'fix' I was bloody horrified to see that they played commercials DURING the game. Yes, they put a "temporary delay" on the game and went to an advert. And they did this six times during the entire match. It was horrible. If you have ever watched coverage of American Football or NHL here you'll know that it is a constant barrage of adverts - looks like they are trying to do the same with soccer.

So being a man of action, I did the only thing I could do. Complain!! Here is there reply:

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Hello,
First off, thank-you kindly for tuning in to our English Premier League broadcasts here on Sportsnet. As you may have noticed this year, we have increased our soccer coverage substantially. In order to accomplish this however, our sales department has had to come up with ways of increasing our revenue streams, and obviously increasing the amount of commercials is the best way for us to do so. As a lifelong fan of the sport I too realize that commercials do interrupt the way we watch our beloved sport, however in order to allow us to bring our viewers more and more of the game, it will unfortunately become a regular occurrence. The difference between soccer and other sports here in North America is that baseball, football, and hockey, to name just a few, all have natural breaks. With this in mind, however, I'm sure either yourself, a friend, or colleague has mentioned how he or she has been sitting a hockey game during a stoppage in play, noticing a lengthy delay before a return to action. This once again can be blamed on t.v. timeouts. While they may come across to the viewer as more natural in these other sports, they still do cause a delay in the game, and it's not something that will change any time in the near future as sporting events become more and more expensive to produce (the added camera angles, quality of shots, and sound, etc.) Having done my best to explain this, I hope you'll take the information into consideration and continue to join us here at Sportsnet once again this Saturday for our continuing coverage of one of the top sporting leagues in the world.

Regards,
Greg Szele
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All I can say is, at least they took the time to reply but it looks like football will be another casualty of programs I watch on TV. My TV is more and more like a paper weight each day....

[spainboy]

[Rich]

Si, that's really cr*p. I suppose it could be worse - they could cancel all football on TV, but even so.

Only thing i can suggest is geta really, REALLY big Dish and point it the right way. May annoy the hell out of the neighbours (and wife), but that's a small price to pay for good footy coverage.