ITV Cleared Over World Cup Goal

ITV has been cleared by Ofcom over an "unfortunate error" which led to HD viewers missing England's opening goal of the World Cup.

In June, the media regulator received 823 complaints after coverage of England's first World Cup match against the USA on ITV1's high definition channel was interrupted by an unscheduled advert break.

The break occurred within the first four minutes of the match, cutting to a ten-second advertisement for Hyundai, followed by a series of black frames lasting a further 11 seconds.

The break meant that HD viewers missed England captain Steven Gerrard score the first goal of the game, but the vast majority of viewers watching on the standard definition service were unaffected.

ITV said that the cause of the incident was a "human error", which occurred within the master control room operated by ITV's transmission provider. Technicolor. The broadcaster said that a 'take-next' trigger had been inadvertently activated, which led to the next scheduled item, the Hyundai sponsorship bumper, being transmitted prematurely.

A statement from Ofcom said: "Following the incident, ITV explained that whilst it could not identify what led to the human error, it had hired external consultants to critically review its operational procedures with Technicolor and would be introducing extra precautions to prevent further such incidents. In particular, Technicolor had removed the live edit functionality from the master control area and was manufacturing covers for the equipment consoles in order to avoid accidental activation of functions that could interrupt programming."

ITV said that though the incident was both "inopportune and regrettable", it believed that only a minority of its audience had been affected by the error.

In response, Ofcom said that the unscheduled break was "understandably disruptive". The statement said: "Ofcom notes ITV's acknowledgement of this error and that during half-time coverage of the match, an apology was broadcast to viewers by presenter, Adrian Chiles.

"Ofcom is also aware that following the match, both ITV and Technicolor apologised for the incident. Ofcom accepts that the incident was an unfortunate error and ITV made no commercial gain from it. We note the operational review ITV is carrying out and the immediate action taken both by ITV and Technicolor including specific measures to avoid this type of incident recurring. In view of this, we consider the matter, on this occasion, to be resolved."

(KMcA/BMcC)