(28-04-2022, 08:58 AM)Steve Williams Wrote:(27-04-2022, 06:34 PM)Tom Wrote: I am right in saying for the Croatia v England (first qualifying game for the 2010 World Cup), ITV grabbed late minute highlights and Matt Smith had to present the highlights from the Granada Reports studio. Also, for the last England game of the 2010 World Cup qualifiers (Ukraine away) was rhat the game with was broadcast on the internet after Setanta went bust and BBC had highlights and again a last minute deal was struck
Yes, the Ukraine highlights were offered very late in the day, I assume one of the conditions of getting them was that it wasn't announced until the match had kicked off to grab every last potential customer, so the news there would be highlights was announced by Bruce Forsyth on Strictly. A great moment, that.
To be pedantic, England's first qualifer for 2010 was Andorra away, on a Saturday night, and there were no highlights of that, with the crowd chanting "we hate Setanta". There was still no deal in place for Croatia away on the Wednesday, and then the clamour got even greater when England won handsomely, and they did a last minute deal with ITV for highlights on the Thursday. As you say, they were presented from the Granada Reports studio and as they'd replaced two half hour shows in the schedule, there were ad breaks during the halves. I remember reading Clive Tyldesley did an off-tube commentary on the Wednesday before the deal was struck, just in case.
Would be fascinated to see Setanta's coverage of that Croatia match again, as they were at the ground but their studio was actually overlooking the car park rather than the pitch and you could see endless buses arriving behind Angus Scott's head. Looked bizarre. Pretty much the last thing they showed was Khazakstan away in June 2009 and I remember that at the last minute they'd decided Khazakh TV coverage wouldn't be good enough so they flew over their own crew to do it all themselves.
Everyone's forgotten about Setanta these days, haven't they?
Did Bruce say it will be nice to see the highlights, to see them nice.