Dave O’Brien loves the words “clean sheets’, he repeats it ad nauseum. Marcelo Balboa loves “fresh legs” and repeats that ad nauseum. Between the two of them they could start a laundry and a poultry farm. O’Brien loves reminding his viewers that this is the knockout stage which means if you lose you get knocked out of the tournament and go home. Got that children. See here we call it elimination.
O’Brien does not know his players either and he is a step too slow in calling the plays because he is busy listening to the feedback from his sonorous voice. The game has gone on about 20 paces ahead and the ball switched between the feet of about 5 players by now. His commentating is a mixture of eulogies and platitudes. In between he will ask Balboa questions like, “What makes Ronaldinho great?” Yep, the right time and the right person to ask these existential questions.
For O’ Brien Appiah becomes Pappoe, Gyan becomes Mensah, Cafu becomes Juan. They are all victims of identity fraud and they do not know it.
Marcelo Balboa still talks as if everybody is hard of hearing. I wonder why these two are still calling the games. We can’t get FIFA to change their atrocious refeering but do we have to listen to this garbage too?
John Harkes and JP Dellacammera don’t know their players but they seem to know the sport of soccer a bit better. They make themselves look like geniuses compared to O’Brien and Balboa.
13 comments on “ESPN’s Dave O’Brien and Marcelo Balboa: The horror continues”
I’m just going to say that I completely agree with you Shourin, I couldn’t say it any better.
yea, O’Brien is horrendous, and either I’m getting more fed up with him or he’s getting worse as the tournament goes on. Occasionally he says something so mind numbingly stupid I begin to laugh uncontrolably. I wish ABC/ESPN would broadcast with a SAP audio channel with just the stadium sounds, that would be awesome.
Or figure out how to use the FIFA 2006 video game announcers! =D
“O’Brien loves reminding his viewers that this is the knockout stage which means if you lose you get knocked out of the tournament and go home.”
Lol, yes he does. And he has numerous ways of doing so, all redundant. There’s of course the overt telling us this is a knockout round. Then there’s the “if they lose they’ll be going home,” and, my favorite, the brilliant, “They’ll have to win here to advance.” Painful.
I was disappointed when Tommy and Adrian said farewell on the last day of group play. I guess chucklehead and hairball are taking us the rest of the way 🙁
It’s obviously Marcelo has no respect for the greatest players he could never be.
IMO, Marcelo should simply be red-carded, throw out of the game, and should never be allowed to sit on the commentator chair again. EVER.
For the past many games, I’ve been holding the remote on my hand throughout the games, just so that I could turn off the speakers whenever Marcelo starts bitching, and trashing what could otherwise have been a great game.
It’s obviously Marcelo has no respect for the greatest players he could never be.
IMO, Marcelo should simply be red-carded, throw out of the game, and should never be allowed to sit on the commentator chair again. EVER.
For the past many games, I’ve been holding the remote on my hand throughout the games, just so that I could turn off the speakers whenever Marcelo starts bitching, and trashing what could otherwise have been a great game.
Can you tell me, please, oh soccer experts, if Marcelo’s view that “diving is part of the game” is a widely held view. He picked on Beckenbauer today for criticizing the players for diving too much, and as a casual every-four-year soccer fan, I gotta say that it seems to be a large part of the sport, at least for some teams, at least during the world cup. It seems that when a player makes a move inside the penalty area, half of his attention is on getting to the goal, and half is on “selling” a foul. This reminds me of the NBA (a sport I don’t watch), only worse. Some of the dives, when seen in slow motion, are absurd — no contact at all.
So — are soccer fans with Marcelo that diving is part of the game, or do true soccer fans find that diving detracts from an otherwise beautiful sport?
Thanks for listening.
O’Brien is doing just fine. Yes, Dellacamera is better and should have been given the final games, but I don’t have a problem with O’Brien. He’s doing alright.
Remember 1994, the incessant “The pass from Dino Baggio to Roberto Baggio, No relation.” comment. Who ever the hell that was said it 1000 times a game. Be thankful you’ll never here that again.
O’Brien is doing just fine. Yes, Dellacamera is better and should have been given the final games, but I don’t have a problem with O’Brien. He’s doing alright.
Remember 1994, the incessant “The pass from Dino Baggio to Roberto Baggio, No relation.” comment. Who ever the hell that was said it 1000 times a game. Be thankful you’ll never here that again.
I couldn’t have worded this any better Shourin. I was so upset at O’Brien during all the Switzerland games (I’m Swiss). He was either totally butchering the names of every players or simply calling them by the wrong names. Get these 2 out of the booth!!!
Oh, and I forgot about Balboa commenting a midfiled foul in the France – Switzerland game:
“Smart foul”
What the hell is a smart foul?
t. > dives are a disgrace to this sport and as far as I’m concerned, penalty box divers should see a red card.
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