The Sport Thread

Sticking with Autumn International Rugby Union coverage for the moment; here is a bit of a laugh. If you were listening to background noise from BBC Sport Scotland's coverage of Scotland vs Fiji autumn international at BT Murrayfield. There was someone speaking to another BBC sound technician's ear piece just before the coverage had ended on BBC One. This employee than walked right in between Dougie Vipond & right in front of his camera shot.

Another walk in camera shot just happened in front of a female reporter on Final Score on BBC One.

The opening night shot of The Aviva Stadium on RTÉ2 was very impressive before the titles started rolling for Ireland vs Argentina. They have Stephen Ferris in alongside Eddie O'Sullivan & Brent Pope for the match at The Aviva.

Great. Channel 4 graphics on Ireland match. First time these have got a gameplay outing.

Odd that it’s so 4:3 safe though.

It looks 4:3 super-safe !!! Awful

RTÉ are in another studio for their coverage from the Aviva. They are in the studio where ITV uses it for their 6 Nations coverage.

Gone a bit too far with the green too. No colour coding for the teams either - how on earth are we supposed to know which team is which?

I may have confused myself about the TV studios from the Aviva. I think Channel 4 is in the same studio as ITV's 6 Nations coverage. At least Channel 4 have done a good bit of effort in adding a nice bit of colour to their own presentation of the match. RTÉ on the other hand have a much bigger space to use with Daire & their 3 analysts for their coverage of the match. RTÉ's setup is about as cheap as you can get really. If you take away the round desk in the middle with the chairs. It looks bland, sterile, cheap, no sense of character & feels like being inside a hospital ward. Although; it feels very convenient though that both RTÉ & Channel 4 are probably located right beside each other in the Aviva.

I take it then that Ryle Nugent is no longer the head of RTÉ Sport. Weird having the voice of Irish rugby matches for so long on another channel.
Technical question were the in game astons generated separately by each channel or was there a source which gets converted into each channels style. (E.g what used to happen to BBC astons at every football world cup.) I know the replay wipes were RTÉ.

I’m only catching up on this now, but RTÉ were pitchside for the pregame. At half time they were back up in the stand, but their studio now seems to be at the Havelock Square end of the West Stand, wheras before it was at the Landsdowne Road end. Also a much smaller desk than previously.

Still, it’s good to have rugby back on RTÉ, albeit briefly. Rugby on RTE now is a bit like golf on the BBC - rare, yet oddly familiar production wise. And just like when you hear the BBC golf theme on those rare occasions, it’s good to hear “Fighting 17th” (yes, the theme from the Kurt Russell film Backdraft, but now for nearly twenty years RTÉ’s rugby theme) again in the build up to a match. (Even if like me you’re watching a recording and already know the score).

Ryle Nugent left RTE at the start of June and now appears to be freelancing - he made an appearance on eir’s Pro14 coverage recently. Hugh Cahill called the game for RTE yesterday.

Were they? They fitted the C4 style very well, although weren't in the shade of green they used elsewhere, a shade that looks great on the Irish jerseys, not so great on TV graphics IMO.

I may be being an idiot here, but does the BBC Two logo normally have this gradient?

Horrid in play graphics on Final Score - three letter abbreviations may be fine for the Premier League but for teams in the 1st round FA Cup are generally useless.