“If this isn’t the time to branch out and offer Scots better athletics coverage, when is?”
The Commonwealth Games may be officially over, but the story of our athletes’ phenomenal success lives on so, have you got your place booked?
This Friday, Team Scotland’s athletes will drive through Glasgow in a convoy of vehicles leaving Kelvingrove Art Gallery at 4.15pm to reach George Square by 5.30pm.
Organisers want us to line the route so medal winners and gallant losers can wave thanks to the crowd for their loud, unstinting, emotional and performance-enhancing support over those astonishing 11 Commonwealth days.
In short, Friday looks set to be another love-in between Scots and our newly-discovered athletic stars. But actually, something far more important is happening on Wednesday though there’s no guarantee it’ll get the same TV coverage in Scotland.
Scotland’s athletes are back in action in the European Championships in Zurich.
The event in Switzerland is as big as our Glasgow Games with 2000 athletes competing. But no camera crew or reporter has been sent to cover the event from BBC Scotland. Isn’t that a bit strange?
Both Eilidh Child, Commonwealth women’s 400m hurdles silver medallist, and Lynsey Sharp, women’s 800m silver medallist, will be running. Not to mention other athletes in Team Scotland who were narrowly pipped for a medal.
Aren’t we interested in what they do next? Don’t we want to see if Lynsey has recovered from the amazing day she clinched silver despite being hospitalised and on a drip? Of course we are. So why no dedicated Scottish coverage from BBC Scotland’s Sports Department?
Auntie says the Euro Championships are on BBC Two at various points during the week with 27 hours of network coverage so there will be prominence for Scottish medallists.
But why aren’t BBC Scotland going for the rock-solid guarantee of coverage the kind you get by sending a dedicated Scottish crew and making space in the prime-time BBC Scotland schedule?
The kind you get by sending folk to Reykjavik and Warsaw for the build-up to recent Celtic games?
Could it be because north of the Border there really only is one sport and now the football season is under way, all the cash, commentators and cameras have already been committed to cover sensational clashes like Motherwell v St Mirren. Likely crowd 5000.
Now I know it’s sacrilegious to question the primacy of the Beautiful Game in Scotland. Football and club loyalty plays a massive part in the affections and the very identity of Scots men in particular.
So football coverage has grown like topsy overshadowing other sports with higher success rates.
Do we still want do spend the lion’s share of sports cash covering every tiny football game in the country? BBC Scotland managers say they’ve tried giving bigger coverage to athletics but after big one-off events, viewer enthusiasm apparently fades.
I’d humbly suggest that might be a wee bit different the week after a Commonwealth Games triumph that saw little Scotland reach fourth in the medals table above mighty India, Kenya and the hyper-fit Kiwis.
Scots now have track superstars and the kind of involvement with their stories that’s normally reserved for Premier League strikers. If this isn’t the time to branch out and offer Scots better athletics coverage, when is?
Indeed, what about a Scottish Sports Review of the Year programme at Hogmanay excluding footie so we can relive the highlights again?
One thing’s for sure. Our athletes are definitely worth it.
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