- This topic has 2,835 replies, 126 voices, and was last updated 2 days, 23 hours ago by
.
- Posts
Sounds like it should be on pay per view. Would be more interesting than anything involving Jake Paul.
I am a retired qualified umpire (in league cricket) and the only thing that annoys me is when the commentators clearly do not know the laws of cricket. Sadly the same applies to many Lords’ members
The one I remember is when the Australian wicketkeeper stumped the Englsh batter ‘who had gone for a walk’ The law states that when a wicketkeeper has caught the ball and holds on to it the ball is dead and the batter cannot be out. However, if he doesn’t hold on to the ball and immediately throws it at the wicket it is still alive. The law in addition states that whether a ball is dead or not is the umpire’s decision. In this case, the umpire correctly lifted a finger. The commentators in challenging this decision only added fuel to the spectators’ ignorance.
Whether it be racing, cricket, or any other sport commentators should know what they are talking about!
Death of a horse on a racetrack is always a bad thing but today highlights to me that all things are not equal. After Wertpols fall in the Juvenile, it was kind of like an afterthought with Alice actually joking with Luke immediately after but when it came to Kalif Du Berlais there was more of a sombre atmosphere; was it a case because one horse has shown more potential than the other? Or the connections of one are more prominant than the other?
And Ed just mentioned that he wished Paul Nichols would have a change of luck in the Lanzorote; why not Harry Derham as well.I think we have to be realistic that the death of a high profile horse is going to elicit a stronger reaction. But ITV are normally good at treating all equine deaths sensitively, and I was quite surprised to hear laughter and joking from the ITV team immediately after Wertpol’s fall; it was pretty obvious it was fatal even before it was confirmed.
Even if for some reason Alice and Luke didn’t see the fall (in which case why were they commenting on the race?), I would hope somebody would be shouting in their ear to tone it down as it seemed tactless and disrespectful. And I say this as someone who likes Alice and Luke as presenters.
Yes, I agree. And I am someone that is always defending ITV Racing. Very insensitive.
What appalled me was that later on, when talking about the racing, Alice Plunkett said, ‘Edwardstone, was overjoyed to watch that’. A time when they were well aware that Kalif Du Berlais had died. Hugely insensitive and a very poor choice of words.
Agree Kenh. Not the first clumsy comment from Plunkett. Worst ITV presenter line-up for today’s wretched events (and, like Moehat, I have a generally positive view of their overall coverage).
Terrible from ITV today,couldn’t be bothered to send anyone to Kempton even though it was the principal meeting and took the race tech pictures from there so could cut away from the injured horses.
Why I am not condoning insensetive comments in any way shape of form, part of the reason they probably made more of the Kalif incident (outside of him being such a high profile horse to begin with) might have been the fact that as the camera pans away from the fence it unfortunately clearly showed a long enough shot of Kalif galloping away whilst holding his right front leg completely off the ground (something I don’t recall ever seeing before).
I didn’t see the earlier race so I can’t comment on whether the camera view would have clearly made it an obviously fatal fall (no interest in wacthing back a replay of it either to compare), but sometimes horrendous looking falls miraculously don’t always end up being fatal and sometimes if the camera only briefly catches the fall on the side of the screen as it pans back to the leaders (and you didn’t fully catch it in real time) then you do have a little leeway but you should clearly err on the side of caution when commenting.
That being said, once you know the horse’s fate it shouldn’t be rocket science for you to be fully moderate you comments overall when discussing the race the incidents took place in and whilst it was clearly a wonderful win for Edwardstone considering his age etc it was sadly completely overshadowed (rightly so) by the loss of Kalif and these experienced commentators should have acted accordingly in all cases.
I do hope that any subsequent BHA inquiry (assume there will be one given there were actually three fatalities on one day at the same course) does not try to pin any blame on the good (good to soft in places) ground conditions being an issue in the incidents.
Finally, my thoughts at this time are firmly with the connections of Wertpol, Kalif and Jonjo O’Neil’s Peso (also fatally injured in the second race) but most especially to the respective grooms of each horse that we lost.
Without wanting to drag up horror stories of past fatalities I was nearly completely turned off racing by Pegwell Bay breaking down when his rear leg went and the C4 cameras stayed on him for some time.
Enough was shown of Wertpol to know he wasn’t getting up from that.
Alice has clearly been around horses all her life and I suspect she is hardened to the downs associated with the sport and shows little emotion at these times.The more I know the less I understand.
Same here RtB, I remember being horrified seeing Pegwell Bay break a leg and not watching racing for a while after that.
Poor Wertpol had a horrendous fall which sadly was obviously fatal and I would expect some respect from the ITV team and the decency to acknowledge that. As LD73 comments, it’s especially tough for the grooms who devote themselves to looking after the horses and have such a bond with their horses.All set to record on series recording. Flashing record symbol when I get back in and the thing hasn’t recorded. Absolute pain.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.