Flashback to the weekend.
– “Hey, Conán. Can you do a behind-the-scenes feature on TG4’s production of the AIB GAA All-Ireland Club Championship semi finals?”
– “Yeah, cool. What time’s throw-in?”
– “4 o’clock on Sunday.”
– “4 o’clock, brilliant. So I’ll need to be there for what time?”
– “Around 8 o’clock.”
Working in TV, eh? Overrated.
Well, actually, it does seem pretty cool when the finished article is coming together and analysts, statisticians, producers, and all sorts of whizz kids are working their magic but no-one tells you about the freezing cold, early morning start, trek to a rain-covered Portlaoise when they tell you about good, old television.
TG4 were broadcasting the semi-final of the AIB GAA Club Championship clash between Slaughtneil and Austin Stacks on Sunday and, from afar, it seemed routine enough. From the comfort of a sofa, it looked like a normal day for TG4 but, from behind the scenes, it is an eye-opener. A real eye-opener.
8.30am
30 people are on site at O’Moore Park with two outside broadcasting lorries (or OB trucks as we like to call them in the TV industry – get with the lingo, for God’s sake) equipped with up to 50 monitors, sound systems, and everything required to feed and receive information from the pitch below and from 89km up the road at Parnell Park.
9am
Seven hours before throw-in here (five before the Allianz Leagues clash between Dublin and Tipperary, also being shown on the channel) the floor manager and his team, engineers and anyone who can lend a hand are in full set-up mode. Cables and wires are being dragged from the trucks all around the grounds before health and safety checks ensure they can stay where they are. Before more checks ensure that they are actually doing what they’re set up to do.
10am
I wake up absolutely exhausted after nine hours sleep and tentatively begin to think about hitting the road to Portlaoise.
10.30am
The stats team arrive and go through a dry run with their tools. In a separate van OB truck, they must send through what they’ve calibrated to the rest of the production team.
11.30am
I eventually get there thinking I’m far too early. The gates are locked up, there’s not a sod on the street and I’m considering going back to Dublin and coming back down again for the game – which after all isn’t for over four hours. Then I see people on the pitch, men climbing scaffolding, and others running around the stands frantically. So people are actually here…
12pm
Time for a quick tea break before the production meeting agus tá gach duine ag labhairt as Gaeilge. Another quirk of being behind the scenes at TG4, everyone converses in Irish. Everyone. It isn’t just on screen, the whole thing is run, the whole social aspect of it all is conducted in our native tongue and it’s blood impressive. It’s beautiful.
12.15pm
The production meeting is taking place and all the relevant heads are there to discuss the plan ahead.
1.08pm
22 minutes until the show is on air, and presenter Míchéal Ó Domhnaill leads his two analysts for the hurling game, Cathal Moore and John Allen, in a run through on the pitch. The Dublin-Tipperary game at Parnell Park will be broadcast from Laois.
1.14pm
The run through gets started after even more i-dotting and t-crossing on the sideline. Ó Domhnaill is a pro but I wonder if he’s raging that the practice run wasn’t live when it goes as well as it does. Like that kid who wants a safety net in a penalty shootout and shouts ‘practice shot’. Then when he scores, ‘practice counts’.
1.31pm
We are on air. Moore, Allen and Ó Domhnaill talk through the hurling game ahead whilst the production truck is a hive of activity working back and forward from stored clips to the live analysis to commercial breaks.
1.55pm
The reins are handed over to Cuán Ó Flatharta up at Parnell Park for the first of the broadcast games but that doesn’t mean anything is winding down at Portlaoise.
2pm
27 screens are in use in the main production area of the OB truck, a further five monitors are up with the analysts. The replay team are all go, as well as the sound and stats guys.
2.20pm
Cathal Moore has already pinpointed Eamon Dillon for the half time treatment. He’s working with technical experts, going through replays of his action so far, topping and tailing clips, inserting all the special arrows so he can use it in his analysis at the break. Dillon then goes and scores a goal so Moore’s attention wasn’t unfounded.
3.10pm
Outside, the Austin Stacks supporters begin to make their electrifying parade down towards the stadium. Every single one of them walking together in colour and voice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy8-d7Eq4CU
3.20pm
The Rockets filter into the stadium, banging that drum, singing their songs, and their designated mascots make their way to the bottom of the stand to make sure the crowd never let up.
3.34pm
Football analysts Aodhan Mac Gearailt and David Henry are taken to the pitch for a lightning quick run through of the preview to the main event because they have four minutes until they are on air.
3.38pm
The coverage for the club semi final has officially begun with the crowd making a huge racket behind the analysts. Stacks are out kicking around and their supporters are cheering every touch of a ball.
3.41pm
Slaughtneil make their way to the pitch and the roar from the Emmet’s fans is absolutely deafening. They completely drown out the Stacks support – for probably the first time ever – and the atmosphere in Laois – for a club game – is truly unbelievable. It is genuinely hard to believe that a sound so loud and so spine-tingling can come from a crowd so small. This is what club football is all about.
4pm
The Slaughtneil-Stacks game throws in and we’re all hands on deck again. The camera men at Portlaoise are all required now.
4.10pm
Two penalties has given the production team plenty to mull over as the replays are rolled out, the analysts look at the build up and debate rages. As Gaeilge of course.
4.31pm
We hit half time and it is absolutely teaming down in Laois. Poor Ó Domhnaill, Mac Gearailt and Henry must brave it though – not to mention the camera men and floor manager – equipped with the essential umbrellas. The crowd in the terrace run for cover beneath the scaffolding but the half time show must go on.
4.34pm
I don’t need to be here, I ration. So I make for the second OB truck to check out what the stats team are up to. Of course, they’ve fed anything they needed to back to the other truck throughout the first half so they can relax for 10 minutes. The football keeps them busier than the hurling does because they’re required to collate extra stats and I’m reliably informed that Slaughtneil’s patient play saw them clock up over 60 hand passes in the first half hour.
5.17pm
This game is a real ding-dong classic and those not involved in the production are catching as much of the action as they can. But, as we head towards the final moments, both hammering at it point for point, there’s a worrying realisation that a draw would see extra time and easily another 30 minutes of the biting cold and soaking rain for the TG4 team.
5.20pm
Slaughtneil edge a thriller but, as the presenter and pundits wind down proceedings on the side of an invaded pitch, people lining up interviews with victorious players and the three on camera trying to keep their composure, a couple of young Slaughtneil men take their opportunity to get face time on national television and they’re jumping mad in the background, walking stylistically in front of the cameras and basically bouncing with euphoria as the floor manager pleads with them to get out of shot.
5.25pm
Míchéal Ó Domhnaill has somehow managed to convince Patsy Bradley to do an interview. Does he even realise what’s happening? Patsy Bradley – the hero, the legend – doesn’t do interviews. Well, not in the 39 times I’ve asked him anyway. He does his talking on the pitch and he slips quietly into the night. I watch on half intrigued, half gut-wrenched as the Slaughtneil midfielder is brought to the sideline in front of the cameras for a moment of history. I really hope Ó Domhnaill appreciates the magnitude of what is going on.
5.30pm
The coverage comes to a close but the work is just starting again for the crew who have the guts of an hour’s work ahead of them to clear everything up again and reload the lorries (OB trucks, sorry).
5.45pm
I’ve already long since sprinted from the scene, jump started the car and pelted up the road well out of sight of anyone who could make use of two extra hands. I’ve seen enough to realise that TV is far from the four-hour package we’re treated to on the sofa. I’ve seen enough to realise that the magic starts with hard work. That players are far from the only ones who put in a shift on a Sunday. That maybe – just maybe – Patsy Bradley’s issue is only with me.
I’ve seen enough.
