Exasperating ‘Flats and Topsy’ show reflects rugby’s wider issues
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The year is 2007. One of Britain’s most renowned and respected dramatists, Steven Berkoff – after whom the in-yer-face “Berkovian theatre” was named – stands in a Sky Sports studio, in front of a black backdrop and upturned lighting. Berkoff appears menacing, a sort of Vincent Price figure, about to deliver Al Pacino’s famous ‘Inches’ speech from the film Any Given Sunday. A cover version, admittedly, but one which replaces Pacino’s gruffness with Berkoff’s gravitas.
This is an advert for the Heineken Cup – now sponsored by Investec, apparently – for which Sky Sports owned the exclusive rights (watch in the video below). Alongside Berkoff’s monologue, there is a slow-motion VT of the previous year’s dramatic moments: the winning tries, the scraps and the bloodied noses. A different era, perhaps, but accompanied with Berkoff’s diction it makes the hairs of any rugby – no, sport – fan stand on end.
In 2007, Sky Sports owned the rights to the Premiership, too. This advert, albeit for European coverage, sticks in the mind because it reflects Sky Sports’ coverage of the Premiership at the time. Stuart Barnes and Dewi Morris as pundits proved a canny double-act, with neither afraid of calling a spade a spade. The Rugby Club, a Thursday night highlights and review show, was essential viewing for any club-rugby fan.
There were highlights, interviews, analysis, opinion and, occasionally, the odd quirky feature. There were few shiny lights, few gizmos and gimmicks; the highlights featured match-day commentary with no music backing – and they were extensive. In nuce, the rugby was allowed to do the talking and flourish. Sky Sports took the Premiership seriously and, therefore, the league took itself seriously. The knock-on effect was that fans took it seriously, too.
It is a model which was mirrored – inspired, more than likely – by football, and one which continues to the present day. Match of the Day, admittedly on free-to-air television, remains vital viewing for even the casual fan, while Monday Night Football offers a level of analysis that mirrors the grandeur of Sky Sports’s rugby coverage, while also having moved with the times. The pundits – bigger names owing to the size of the sport – often set the agenda for the week and debate can be heated. Even as someone who is not particularly fussed by events in the round-ball world, it is often intoxicating. What football coverage is not, at its best, is chummy, self-deprecating and obsessed with (dreadful) banter. There is humour in Sky Sports’ coverage, often borne out of the catharsis that comes from a white-knuckle exchange. The humour is natural, not forced.
What does all this have to do with rugby? Last week, our esteemed sports-on-television columnist, Alan Tyers, asked for some recommendations of regular rugby programmes that would be worth a watch – for research purposes. Given Rugby Tonight has now bit the dust, before replying, it seemed sensible to watch ITV’s highlights show with “Flats and Topsy” (David Flatman and Topsy Ojo).
It was the derby weekend, and the show left me flabbergasted, exasperated. Flatman and Ojo as presenters are smooth, and are clearly following higher orders, but the obsession with dad jokes – the Ant and Dec tribute act – and the persistent denigration of the derby weekend is reflective of English rugby’s wider issues. Of course, a sport needs to be humble enough to laugh at itself every now and again, but after last season, with three clubs going to the wall, if not even the presenters of the Premiership’s free-to-air highlights show are willing to take the league seriously, then why should anyone else? Why should the media? Why should the fans who pay their (increasingly vast) sums of money to watch the games?
How often would you hear the likes of Roy Keane, Jamie Carragher or Gary Neville joke about whether Dan Cole (or a footballing equivalent) had his breakfast? Or Barnes or Morris for that matter? How often do football fans hear a ‘bald’ joke, a ‘stupid’ joke or a ‘fat’ joke in commentary or analysis? My football fanatic colleagues tell me: seldom. After last season, Premiership rugby might have reduced itself to laughing-stock status, but the shooting-in-the-foot this season has bordered on the perverse. This was the season to return with a bang, to return with the sort of Berkovian gravitas that was all too easy to deliver in 2007 when the sport and its competitions were thriving. But, now, when the backs are against the wall, in a time of adversity, is where it is needed more than ever.
That is certainly understood within the walls of Premiership Rugby’s HQ, among the executives doing a valiant job attempting to rebuild the league’s allure, given their introduction of the derby weekend (and the accompanying hype). But maybe the memo could be passed on to the broadcasters, too. Maybe rugby has a paucity of engaging pundits?
Whatever the reason, the Premiership and all of its stakeholders simply must start taking it more seriously – before it’s too late.
