Cattermole blunder

[carvillshill]

In fairness to the UK boys, Des Scahill continues to descend into mediocrity- in a chase at Killarney tonight he failed to spot any of the five fallers at the time they fell, including Tony Martin’s who took an absolute purler at the first and the 9/4 fav who fell at the fourth.Have a look on ATR at the 6.30 race for an example of either blindness or complete lack of interest. If Catt gets more heat in England we’d love to have him over here!

[Pendle_Gazza]

Hi all, first post. As someone else said, considering the amount of horses, colours, daft names etc. it is amazing the commentators don’t make more mistakes. Generally they make a decent fist of it.

I haven’t seen the winner mix-up, but I have to say, going right back to the National, that Catt’s mix-up of the greys was exceptionally poor, and the excellent Richard Hoiles pretty much got him out of a hole that day.

The thing that disappoints me most are the commentators who often don’t relay everything that is happening all around the race (i.e. I like to know if Horse X gets up after a nasty tumble) – and Des Scahill is most definitely in that category.

But hey, what do I know? I do actually enjoy Derek ("Horse X is sluggish away") Thompson’s commentaries!

[Alderbrook]

As has already been pointed out, this is not Cat’s first error in recent times. He also doesn’t appear to care for making the errors, at least publicly?

Again, as has already been mentioned, the job of a commentator is very tough. However, that does not mean that errors should be accepted. Other commentators seem to be able to do a comparably better job, which suggests there are reasons behind the lapses. Is he just not as good, or is he not putting in the work required due to other commitments?

Which brings me to Thommo. Would I have more likely lambasted him? No, not more so than Cat, but that’s because I think they are both ‘poor’ (in relative terms) for commentators. I would have done so against a better commentator though.

Why? Because he does not have the redeeming abilities that some of the others have. He is an insincere cretin.

I also recall an AW race on C4 a few years back. The number cloth of one of the runners got caught under the saddle so you could only see the number 1 – rather than 14 or 15 or whatever it was. All the way up the straight you had Thommo with ‘silence’ (a boon in many ways) as he could not work out which horse was in the lead. It was at this time that I realised Thommo really did commentate by numbers…

[Seagull]

First of all,
Welcome to the forum Red Evie and pendle gazza

There are some easy races such as Billion Dollar Kids last night where any amatuer or professional commentator would find the game easy.
Just a few horses with easy to pick out colours and the winner always easy to spot with no challengers.

Without the ‘in running’ merchants feeling robbed would the Windsor race have been a big issue?

Two rides by jockeys yesterday were far worse yet have escaped any adverse comments on here.

Ruby Walsh last night at Killarney on Uncle Junior. Why did Ruby not make any attempt to get a little closer 2 fences out. Here was a horse lobbing along jumping well yet the jockey seemingly happy to allow the eventual winner so much of an easy lead?

The other was by Travis Block at Brighton. Why did Travis not understand that he was not going to get any run up the rails in this race? Why did he not realise that he was on a horse that was going well and then bring Hand Painted out so at least he may have had a chance to win or get placed?

I never backed these two horses but if I had I would be feeling upset about these two rides far more than a genuine mistake by the ‘Cat’.

[yeats]

I have also been in the commentary box with John Hunt a few times and seen him learn a 16 runner handicap field from scratch and call the race and make it look easy.

Best thing to do for all the sniping at commentators is to turn the sound off the telly, get your Racing Post and have a go yourself if you think commentating is easy.

So you’re saying John Hunt makes it look easy but it isn’t? Maybe John Hunt is a good commentator. In fact your argument about turning the sound down and have a go yourself doesn’t hold water. You may as well say put Mike Cattermole in front of a milling machine or on top of a horse to see how easy it is, like most of us he wouldn’t have a clue.
Commentators are very well paid and if they don’t get it right they should work very hard to get it right, it’s obvious some can’t be bothered.
What was it Gary Player used to say, the more he worked and practiced at the game the luckier he became at it.

[sberry]

i’ll agree with that seagull, as well as having zero sympathy for in running punters and 1.01 and 1000 players – travis did damn well to find trouble in running with only 3 other runners in the race – i was thinking formation riding in that last furlong or two

[% MAN]

I also recall an AW race on C4 a few years back. The number cloth of one of the runners got caught under the saddle so you could only see the number 1 – rather than 14 or 15 or whatever it was. All the way up the straight you had Thommo with ‘silence’ (a boon in many ways) as he could not work out which horse was in the lead. It was at this time that I realised Thommo really did commentate by numbers…

Haven’t seen the particular race so cannot comment.

Generally for commentating / race reading the "priority" for identification is:-

Silks – obvious really

Cap colour – quite often a life saver

Horses Face – a very important factor, especially head on. Noseband, blinkers (colour ones help – although if they can coordinate it helps, there was a race the other week where two horses had yellow blinkers and two green – more of a hinderance in the end), white flashes and marks on the face etc.

Then last of all saddle cloth number.

On the subject of saddle cloths that is something we can learn from our American friends. I was at Kempton on 4th July last year where they had an American theme racing night – obviously they had Mark Johnson doing the call. But they also had American saddle cloths where the colour of the cloth equated to the horse number – as in greyhound racing. My initial reaction was how stupid. However by the third race, once I had learned the colours, I was converted – it was a very useful additional aid in identification.

[ReMoBet]

It seems to me the callers all want to be "characters" nowadays adding in their own smart, rehearsed comments. Adds nothing to the listeners experience IMO.

The one thing I regularly notice when MC calls is that he always tries to make the finish "exciting".

Every race at Windsor he calls a couple of nags as closing in the final furlong or "getting on terms" when it is obvious they aren’t.

Call whats there, let the unfolding race itself provide the excitement.

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