This blog first appeared as a TV Review in the Andersonstown News
Coverage of the Tokyo Olympics sliced into the TV scheduling on most channels, notably BBC and RTÉ. I’m not in a position to comment on the RTÉ coverage, because any time I tried to get it I was informed this was not available where I lived.
And so I was driven to consume on BBC. As is almost always the case, the BBC do a polished job of presenting the different sports, and if my heart sank a little whenever another British athlete won another medal, because I knew the yipees and way-hays would go on for some time, it’s impossible to deny – the British had a very good Olympic Games – more medals than you could shake a baton at.
Ireland didn’t do too badly either. The Belfast boxer Aidan Walsh might have restricted himself to bronze with that lep of delight, but a bronze is a bronze. On the other hand, a gold is the one that hits the emotional bull’s eye.
We got two very different golds this time. In the early days of the Olympics, Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy won gold in the lightweight double sculls. From West Cork, they managed to make it sound like something they did just for the craic, like, we stumbled on this Olympic Games and sez I to Paul, sure we might as well have a go at it, and wouldn’t you know, one thing led to another and here we are after winning gold!
That was early in the Games. At the tail-end of the Games –very early on Sunday morning (local time), the final in the lightweight group was fought between Ireland’s Kellie Harrington and Brazil’s Beatriz Ferreira. The commentators figured that some nifty work from Kellie earned her the medal; I wasn’t so sure. Her shorter opponent certainly thought she had won it. But she hadn’t.
However, none of the Cork witty remarks from Kellie. She went straight into shock, her face red and tear-filled. For God’s sake, Kellie – you won. Stem the tears – your ma and all the ones in Portland Row are going mad. As well they might. They danced and lepped, while back in Tokyo Kellie knelt and did a ‘We worship thee’ movement with her arms and her forehead lowered until it touched the ground.
Which made it all the sweeter that she’d won, won, WON! No second place, no gallant draw – she WON! Even the BBC commentators commended her for what she’d achieved at 31 years of age. Fair play. She’s written her name in the Olympic annals.
Me: I’m exhausted. And now the resumption of the Premier League has come at us like a runaway stallion. Brace yourselves.
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