Brolly – Olympics coverage is boring

Dublin GAA footballer Bernard Brogan, left, and former Republic of Ireland footballer Paul McGrath perform a “torch kiss” transferring the Olympic Flame during the hand over of the Olympic Torch on Samuel Beckett Bridge

The BBC’s vast wall-to-wall coverage of the Olympics is nice. Relentlessly nice.

“There’s been an upset at the Archery” said the very nice Hazel Irvine on Wednesday morning and over we went to watch the nice English girl with the plaster on her cut chin (an archery accident? A shaving accident?) releasing arrows from a bow that would have allowed Robin Hood to rule the known world; the sort of bow that trained CIA assassins might use against the tree people of Sumatra if they ever threw their lot in with Al Qaeda.

A futuristic 007-style weapon with sights, weight calibrators, and cross bars.

“I could do that”  my six-year-old son suggested.

As the ladies looked through their mercury-balanced sights and shot mostly nines or tens, the commentator chimed in with analysis such as “I say” and “My word, this is close.”

When the English girl unexpectedly won, she and her opponent – Deepika Kumari, the current world number one – smiled, embraced and waved at a crowd so tiny that even the directors of Tobermore FC would have been embarrassed.

“Isn’t that lovely?” ventured the archery pundit Liz Mynott. It was like a Lassie movie.

Then it was back to the studio where Ian Thorpe, the legendary Australian swimmer, was discussing the pool antics with the very nice Gary Lineker.

When I heard Thorpe was part of the BBC’s punditry team I was thrilled. The Thorpedo himself! Surely this would be an Aussie with attitude.

Turns out he has attitude in abundance: the attitude of a respectful teenage boy being introduced to his girlfriend’s parent’s for the first time.

The Fosters lager ads portrayal of the Aussie male is obviously totally up the left. According to the Thorpedo, to paraphrase Monty Python “Every swimmer is sacred.”

Every English swimmer and even the Irish ones, have “a great chance of doing well.”
“What do you think of James’s chances in the 200m freestyle?” asks Lineker.

“The heats look very tricky.”
To which the only truthful answer is: “Get a grip Gary. The boy hasn’t a f***ing mission.”

The full story is in the current issue of Gaelic Life, published on Thursday August 2. Buy your copy now in your local newsagent, or you can purchase the online version – for only 90p – by clicking here