There have been plenty of feed outages and associated technical difficulties for broadcasters over the years, but the timing couldn’t have been worse for Canada‘s Sportsnet Sunday. The Rogers-owned broadcaster was showing the Davis Cup final between Canada and Australia from Málaga, Spain, which Canada eventually won.
That marked the first time the Canadian team had ever won this since-1900 tournament, the top international team tournament in men’s tennis. And Canada became just the 16th country to claim a Davis Cup title. And it led to quite the celebration following Felix Auger-Aliassime’s final shot, as seen above. But Sportsnet’s feed from the tournament site crashed shortly before that happened, forcing the broadcaster to go back to their studio coverage:
https://twitter.com/shayman/status/1596893582908338177
https://twitter.com/shayman/status/1596896680657682432
Epic fail for @Sportsnet They have rights to show @DavisCup final where Canada is about to win for first time ever and apparently their satellite feed can't handle rain. Sportsnet has no business having rights to big Canadian moments! @TSN_Sports not much better but geez!
— Pete H (@PMan71) November 27, 2022
This is such a shame that the satellite goes out before the end of the match. It would have been nice to see Canada win its face Davis Cup title. Do better #sportsnet #DavisCupFinals
— Talan-Tee-J (@tal_jay) November 27, 2022
like my Dad when I messed up as a child is how I feel about sportsnet. Go away, I don't even want to look at you right now. #changechannel
— John Reid (@JohnReid9912) November 27, 2022
We win! No thanks to @Sportsnet #DavisCupFinals pic.twitter.com/vV7hnoDlcR
— Brian Gerstein (@RaptorsDevotee) November 27, 2022
This also led to quite the responses to Sportsnet’s tweet announcing the result. Here are some of those:
So glad to be able to have watched the boys bring it ho- wait…
— Nate Britten (@nateb2399) November 27, 2022
We’ll take your word for it since you lost the feed and we couldn’t see it happen!!! 🤬🤦🏻♀️
— SlyM 🇨🇦🌻🇺🇦 (@SlyM) November 27, 2022
Would have been great if this was broadcasted in Canada. @Rogers is so embarrassing.
— Hank Rearden (@Rearden_Metals) November 27, 2022
“Heavy rain” the cause?!? Really? Satellites made of cardboard?
— Jason Cull (@jasoncull) November 27, 2022
If only we could have seen The Historic Victory 😡 just brutal!! But thanks for the late to the party text 👍
— Karen Mackinnon 💙🇺🇦💛🌻 (@KMacK0630) November 27, 2022
As noted above, this is far from the first or the last technical difficulty to happen in sports, and even far from the first feed loss of this scale. But it’s certainly highly unfortunate timing, especially for a company (Sportsnet parent Rogers) that already had one giant and widespread internet outage this year. At least Sportsnet has put the final moments, including Auger-Aliassime’s tournament-winning forehand smash past Alex de Minaur, on their website now, so those who missed this live thanks to the feed issues can check it out there.
Still, this is brutal for the Canadian tennis fans who were watching and hoping to see history happen live. Instead, they got that history delivered from a studio update a continent away from where the action happened.
[Top image screengrabbed from a video on Sportsnet’s website]
