Where in the world? GB News gets Wales’ match location and opponents mixed up
GB News continued a run of confusing geographic matters related to Wales today as they claimed that Rob Page’s team would be squaring up, not against Italy, but against the Italian capital Rome – and at Wembley.
The channel claimed that the match ‘Wales v Rome’ was being played at 5pm at Wembley stadium.
In reality, Wales will play Italy at the Stadio Olimpico in a match to decide who will top Group A.
It’s the second geographical mix-up by GB News related to Wales this week after they placed Llandovery in the middle of Birmingham.
The TV station’s chyron claimed a segment ‘from our GB News reporters nationwide’ was filmed in the rural Carmarthenshire market town.
In reality, the background was Alum Road in Saltley, an inner-city area of Birmingham east of the city centre.
Can’t wait for Wales vs Rome at 5pm! #GBNewsFails pic.twitter.com/59kN90o8h5
— GBNews Fails (@GBNewsFails) June 20, 2021
The Wales v Rome error caused much mirth on social media, with many suggesting it was a throwback to the days when the Celts and Romans were at war.
“They had a hard time defeating the Silures for sure,” Bri Rhys said.
“I can reveal Boudicca and Spartacus have made the transition to Welsh nationality so they can play in this match and finally take down Rome!” said Adam Ditchburn.
“Tune in to watch Wales take on the might of the Roman Empire only on Gammon News!” John Spiers said.
“Nero, Caligula, marcus Aurelius, Claudius, Hadrian, Augustus. Quite a team the Romans have at their disposal,” an anonymous user suggested.
‘Suspended’
The mix-up is the latest to draw criticism by viewers after the channel’s launch was plagued by problems, including an unclear picture, audio echo and microphones that did not work.
The channel has also run into an advertising boycott after Ikea, Kopparberg and Octopus Energy withdrew their ads from the network after it was launched on Sunday.
IKEA said: “We are in the process of investigating how this may have occurred to ensure it won’t happen again in future, and have suspended paid display advertising in the meantime.”
The boycott relates to the channel’s partisan content, with veteran broadcaster Andrew Neil claiming that the channel would not be “another echo chamber for the metropolitan mindset that already dominates so much of the media”.
Campaign group Stop Funding Hate, meanwhile, has challenged advertisers on social media to stop funding the channel.
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Probably a deliberate attempt at taking the pi55 out of Wales, it’s the sort of thing these feeble minded right wing knuckle draggers do.
Right wing? Mostly. Feeble minded? Well, they get hack journos on the other side of the aisle to write about them, thus boosting their paltry bandwidth. Why don’t we ignore them and focus on Cymru?
This is getting ridiculous now, Nation! You began by providing free advertising for this garbage news outfit by heralding their launch as though they were mustering to invade Gwent, then you covered what a clutch of people on twitter thought about it, then you covered a geographic mix up they did and now your covering typos as if it’s news! Please stop trying to win this race to the bottom, rise above instead. Nobody cares a jott about this, it’s the worst example of bubble-dwelling, echo chamber building, insider baseball ‘journalsim’ – it’s in your news section! Nation Cymru yw… Read more »
I think NC is mainly trying to demonstrate how c rap GBNews is. They don’t need to prove anything, just let people watch it for 5 minutes!
Well thanks to nation’s blanket coverage, there will be plenty of new viewers, extending the life of the channel they hope dies. If this were any other news site it’d be another example of the degradation of journalism, but this site purports to be our new national media outlet. Stories like this undermine our movement, make us look like petty, bitter ideologues and confirm that we are exactly what we accuse the likes of the GB newsroom of being – thick as mince (providing unpaid advertising for a competitor, all from a company they’ve probably never heard of). Nation seem… Read more »
Agree. Diplomacy, diolch. We will need to sell stuff when Indy comes, and need friends also. We know who our enemies are.
Right wing ? More like right mess ! So many gaffes I doubt whether they can tell left from right, up from down etc etc Surprised that Andrew Neil hasn’t been able to better organise the entire thing. Still it serves as good giggle material, not to be taken seriously.
Watching Guto and enjoying. GB News being anti Welsh is nonsense.