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news
Sir Dave Brailsford (BBC via iPlayer).jpgTeam Sky can be trusted 100% says Brailsford in awkward BBC interview
Sir Dave Brailsford says he does not accept that people have lost faith in Team Sky in the wake of UK Anti-Doping’s (Ukad) investigation. However, the Team Sky principal also somewhat contradictorily admitted that, “there might be a PR issue.”
This would appear to be something of an understatement. Some of the evidence Brailsford supplied to the select committee for culture, media and sport was branded ‘extraordinary’ and ‘very disappointing’ by Ukad chairman David Kenworthy, while the chair of the committee has expressed frustration at the lack of a paper trail relating to the contents of the package delivered to the 2011 Critérium du Dauphiné.
Speaking to the BBC during a tense interview likely to provide ample source material for armchair body language experts (we challenge you to watch the whole thing without getting distracted by his elaborate hand gestures), Brailsford said it was ‘regrettable’ that issues had cast a cloud over the team’s achievements.
He added that, “the test of time is the key thing and over time we will continue to perform at the highest level, continue to do it the right way, continue to give people a reason to get behind us and feel proud of our achievements.”
Assessing the impact of the furore, he said: “There’s a difference between handling and active wrongdoing, you know. Let’s be clear. There might be a PR issue and there’s the actual facts of any wrongdoing. What we’re doing is contributing to a process that can get to the truth.”
Some would say the team’s PR shortcomings hinge on an ability to provide clear answers to certain key questions. Asked whether he’d provided paperwork supporting his claims that it was Fluimucil that was in the infamous package, Brailsford offered only: “I’ve given everything I’ve got to UK Anti Doping.”
Responding to a suggestion that fans would be reassured to know that paperwork did exist, he replied: “We’re contributing everything we’ve got to the process,” before reiterating that he wasn’t going to comment on specifics until after the outcome of the Ukad investigation.
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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I think this story was started by the Daily Fail however there has yet been no evidence found of wrongdoing, pushing the limits of the rules maybe. It seems that some are just clutching at straws to knock down the success of Team Sky & Wiggins for whatever reason.
Have a look at UKAD website and you will see that most of the bans on there are for rugby players or boxers, maybe they could go ask the rugby & boxing unions why so many are being caught doping and what they are doing about it.
He needs to practice his Jedi mind tricks more. They were very weak against this hardened hack.
"We only keep asking questions because the answers are not acceptable... We need to keep asking questions."
Given the vagaries of the English language and the persistence of the multitude of questioners who want to be in on a story it's no wonder that answers given are negative, confusing and contradictory - or unacceptable. Only the most eloquent orators would be able to keep their head above water. Even truthful answers carry no truth to someone who doesn't want to hear the truth and evasive answers just reinforce the mistrust in the audience (or those that are still awake...).
Until UKAD coplete their investigation and report on their findings it's all pie in the sky. Of course, when their report is released we can start all over again because their findings won't be acceptable either!
Absolutely.
So why comment on it? Because it's interesting gossip-fodder, and the UKAD ruling hasn't come back yet (I've got no confidence that it will be decisive either way either). We're even chatting about chatting about it now.
I agree with the rest of your post, btw; there are deeply entrenched people on both sides, and predictable 'Sky are evil' vs 'you leave Sky alone' comments would hit any article that had Sky in the title.
I've no axe to grind and have enjoyed Sky's and BC's success, but, objectively: if we're living through a hint of scandal at the biggest British cycling team ever by a bazillion miles, or possible 'regime change', or discord between the Top Dog and top rider, well, of course this is going to get comments going on a British cycling site.
Haven't watched the interview as I've stopped bothering with Dan Roan and the BBC.
In the time this story has been dragging along we have had lots of much bigger sport scandals come and go:
England football boss sacked for offering to help break the rules, now back managing, what was the punishment.
Boxer stripped of title, taking recreational drugs due to depression.
Footballers saying they were sexually abused as kids, how many clubs involved?
I could go on, so why is the Sky story still news. I reckon it's the BBC, they don't cover cycling so it does them no harm to keep digging and helps them justify spending the sport budget on elitist sports. Sports like tennis, a minority sport with dwindling participation.
of the four sports that people do participate in, swimming, athletics, cycling and football, only the last gets any airtime on the BBC.
I reckon it's time to shut the BBC sport department down, and time cycling websites stopped helping them pursue their agenda.
how prominent on the beebs website is today's news that a top premier football club hasn't been notifying the FA of the whereabouts of its players for drug testing?
Road.cc - the former cycling website that is now just a tabloid in the manner of the Daily Fail.
Any chance we could have a day without you raking through the same story over and over again?
What's up, do you hate success that much that you have to destroy it?
So what if Wiggins or Froome had a TUE (and they've both had them), that doesn't make them cheats, that makes them performing within the rules.
howabout we just wait and see if UKAD ever actually come up with any evidence of anything?
No, thought not
It's just that if the journalists had stopped after they asked Sky if there was a package and sky said 'yes, but for Emma Pooley', then that would have done the pulic a disservice. Sky have kept making knee jerk statements to try to make the bad PR go away, and then it's been shown that their statements can't possibly be true. How do we even know that the current statements are true? It's like they're just keeping on trying different answers until the problem goes away.
If only they'd never said 'no needles', and if they'd been open about the TUE's (Froome seems to have been, which seems to be keeping out of the spotlight on this some what), and then said that 'we don't cheat, but we do do EVERYTHING that is allowed within the letter of the law to win'.
I suspect the past six months for Sky will become a case study for those studying sports management at university of how not to handle PR and journalists.
Gosh that was uncomfortable and he was clearly feeling out of his depth from the 'not waving but drowning' hand gestures.
Doesn't mean that they've done anything 'wrong' of course but I do wonder what on earth has happened to Team Sky's publicity machine.
It feels like he will go, which will probably make it harder for Sky to win TdF and for Froome to get his 5. CF should consider on which side his bread is buttered perhaps.
I find this whole thing quite boring. Everytime I see another Team Sky/Brailsford/Wiggins TUE story, it seems like the only actual news is 'how a PR department has reacted 'publically' to a bit of bad PR' which just smacks of someone elses adgenda who has it in for Team Sky... I'm struggling to see anything of interest here unless I'm missnig some very glaring point somwhere where Sky have actually broken the rules and doped?
It is getting a bit boring. Some people keep 'asking questions' because they want to find out that Sky cheated. They are so scarred from 15+ years of cheating that they want to scratch the itch that is Sky. Meanwhile the true is more prosaic; Sky bent the rules as far as they could to win. If that leaves a bad taste in your mouth, sorry, but you'd be better off putting your energies elsewhere.
It's all a bit like Hillary's emails, having another hearing won't find anything, but is good for mud slinging.
We only keep asking questions because the answers are not acceptable... We need to keep asking questions. David Walsh wouldn't stop asking questions. He was villified and castigated and even sued. He kept asking questions. Thank god David Walsh kept asking questions when everyone else said "you'd be better off putting your energies elswehere".
Bad example, Lance wan't working within the rules, Sky have worked upto the limit of the rules as I read it. The point it that there is at least one story a day on a lot of British cycling websites for the past month or so, simply about asking questions, FFS ! It's like certain media outlets are just trolling Sky !
Sky keep doing their best to make it news!
This is about a British team that has won the TdF 4 times in the last 5 years, and is (was?) inextricably linked to British Cycling and riders who have dominated the last 3 Olympics, including London 2012; teams that have repeatedly made clean riding part of their image.
If this was just legal decongestant being delivered by an employee, then yes - it looks a bit odd that it'd take a while to get to the rider, but it is well within Sky's control-freakish MO, so not news.
Throw in some intrigue, a Sky leak along the lines of 'look at that package'. Interesting... a hint of wrongdoing? The Sky PR machine not being as tight as we all thought it was?
Throw in a UKAD investigation and the obligatory MPs' pantomime... Interesting.
Throw in public comments by people (including Brailsford) who probably shouldn't be making public comments on this at the moment... Interesting.
Throw in Sky and Brailsford's story changing, at one point, almost daily, and what that brings us to is that even Brailsford's squirms are newsworthy now.
What I find boring is the faux surprise at any of that ^ not being newsworthy; the faux naivete at the way news works; the 'nothing to see here' moaning by would-be censors about any negative articles about Sky.
Edit: misterbee's dig at the BBC is totally valid. That doesn't mean the Sky story isn't news (it isn't only the BBC that run articles on it); it means that the BBC is shit at prioritising and finding original items, which has been the case for... as long as I can remember. A cynic might suggest the Murdoch angle gives extra incentive for other publications to stick the boot in; an unfortunate side-effect of trying to take over the world.
great questioning, I thought. Love watching the micro-expressions flicker across DB's face as the interviewer gets busy with the salt-shaker over yet another open wound. I don't know the truth of the issues raised, very few of us actually do, but Sky have definitely made a giant pigs ear of the whole thing
I'm impressed with the questions because the interviewer asks some very good ones, then repeats them with the point that DB has answered something else entirely different, then moves on to the next one, having made the point without hammering it out like Paxman vs Howard
In fairness to Dave, watch any interviews where he's not in the thick of the racing paddock, such as this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjBd0GVyJw0 and you'll see his hand gestures are a normal thing. He does a decent turn at avoiding answering questions though it's true.
Anyone who is 100% trusting of anything in professional cycling either started following it five minutes ago, was educated at Trump University, or believes £350m per week will be invested in the NHS due to Brexit. (I was going to say "is a shareholder in the Brooklyn Bridge" but that seems positively sagacious by comparison.)