Edward Scissorhands strikes again

I need to vent. Didn’t get to see a game live last night, or on TV, because her-to-whom-I-have-just-taken-a-pot-of-green-tea-upstairs (note to self: come up with better comedy nickname) and I went to the theeeat-or. Harrogate was the venue, the magnificent Count Arthur Strong – The Man behind the Slime (sic) the show. Most entertaining it was too. Had the pleasure of meeting the good Count afterwards – he is currently wading through my history of northern comedy (on sale at all good bookshops) – and a splendid fellow he proved to be. Most of his clan seem to be from the likes of Leeds, Dewsbury and Wakefield so there are probably league fans among them although, like the diligent blogger I am, I forgot to ask. “Martin! Put the music on!” Catch him on tour if you can.

Any road, although I wasn’t there in person, I was able to make excellent use of a marvelous new invention called the ‘Sky Plus’. In a nutshell, it allows you to ‘tape’ programmes that you would have watched had you stopped in but – here’s the best bit – WITHOUT ANY TAPE IN THE MACHINE. Remarkably, the Sky Plus is extremely easy to operate – the pressing of a single button does the job nicely – and is surely the best domestic invention since the kettle, sliced bread and vibrating rabbit combined. So well done Sky inventors. Big pat on the back there.

Tragically, however, when I settled down to watch Huddersfield versus Bradford this morning – having stayed clear of the scoreline (the Likely Lads would have had no bother if they had been rugby league fans) – it swiftly became apparent that taping the midnight highlights show had not been a good idea (couldn’t tape the real thing, as HTWIHJTAPOGTU wanted two episodes of something called Lost). Put briefly, who the hell edits these things and why – given that Sky Sports have no less than FOUR 24-hour channels to fill – does it have to be only highlights at all? Okay, you get to see the tries, the so-called pivotal moments and about five minutes of the kickers lining up their attempts whether the goal is destined to go over or not, but otherwise the shape of the game is wrecked completely. I was looking forward to studying the tactics of each team, assessing the individual impact of the likes of Matt Orford and David Fa’alogo, generally enjoying the ebb and flow… you know the drill. But thanks to the way in which the programme seemed to be have been cut with garden shears and then stuck back together with masking tape, all of that was impossible. Instead, it was just a procession of ‘events’ – a sort of Goals on Sunday for rugby but without Martin Tyler screaming the scorer’s name in that irritating mock-excited unconvincing way of his. And I say it again, why does it have to be highlights anyway? It’s not as though there isn’t bags of TV airtime to fill.

And then, just to add insult to injury, we get half an hour of something called Super League – Extra Time tagged on! Gah! I have nothing against this chatathon in the general run of things; normally available only through the red button more usually reserved for Commissioner Gordon, it is a nice way to bring the curtain down on any match – and last night’s little episode regarding Stevo’s diet and teeth, and Eddie’s fabled wig, was genuinely comical. No harm in any of that at all. But why does it take up so much time on the sodding replay showing? If I have taped a game it is because I want to watch THE GAME – surely that’s obvious? Why would I want to see several people in suits mulling over something that I haven’t fully seen instead?