Colour news story and Critical reflection Essay Example

COLOUR NEWS STORY AND CRITICAL REFLECTION

Colour News Story and Critical Reflection

Colour News Story and Critical Reflection

Colour News Story-A football match between Sydney FC and Brisbane Roar FC

At 4 pm, the Sydney FC players emerged first, to be greeted by an atmosphere that has been known to break weak spirits, an uninterrupted cacophony of whistles, expletives, and boo. Only hardened veterans of such encounters like Terry McFlynn, allowed themselves the cheek of lifting up their arms in a defiant greeting, fuelling even greater insults and cheers from the crowd. Other players seemed awkwardly displaced, limbering up and passing the ball mechanically, nervously avoiding direct eye contact with the crowd. But this was a mere tremor before the earthquake, a token wisp of smoke on the tip of the volcano, before the eruption that took place as the blue and red colors of the Brisbane Roar Football Club players spill out on the field. The crowd rose like a tidal wave around the stadium, singing the anthem of the club, unfurling giant flags, and paper mosaics, as well as detonating thunderclaps. For quite a few seconds, the entire stadium roared its loyalty as it was covered with a shower of paper ribbons and blue and red balloons, descending like friendly Martians, the members of the space.

Before the match kicked off, I decided to interview one of the spectators; I wanted to know why the match attracted such a huge crowd. So I went ahead and asked a gentleman who was seated next to me, his name was Yeping Liu. According to Yeping Liu, the match between Brisbane Roar usually attracts such a huge crowd because the two clubs are two of the richest, most successful and influential football clubs in Australia. I also learned from Yeping Liu’s friend by the name Wandong Bao that the two clubs have been acknowledged as the biggest-spending sports teams in Australia when it comes to average pay packets.

The match soon kicked off, and in its fanaticism, the crowd seemed to abandon its democratic credentials, acting with brutal uncompromising tones of corporate rally. Every move played by the Sydney FC players was greeted with abuse. The game itself was a bruising encounter of individual talents, sporadic runs at goal, brief instances of brilliance, and far too many mistakes, and yet not once did the game sunk into mediocrity. Approximately ten minutes into the game, Brisbane Roar’s power horse Besart Berisha broke through the midfield from just inside his own half, beat two opponents, then, anticipating a third challenge, served his team mate, Issey Nakajima-Farran with an impeccable pass. Without wasting time, Issey Nakajima-Farran, who also plays for Australia’s national team, made a strike that beat Sydney FC’s goalkeeper, but it was just deflected by the left goalpost. Three minutes later, it was Terry McFlynn’s turn to rattle the defense of Brisbane Roar with a characteristic swerving free kick, which has the Brisbane Roar’s goalkeeper, Michael Theoklitos only just tipping off to a corner. What transformed the game from an evenly balanced slug-out to a walkover was the red-card booking of Sydney FC’s player, Pascal Bosschaart in the twenty-fifth minute of the second half. It was later noted from Quanzheng Lin, one of the fans of Sydney FC football club that the referee was a close friend of Brisbane Roar’s manager, and that he favors the Brisbane Roar team. According to Quanzheng Lin, the foul committed by Pascal Bosschaart did not deserve even a yellow card leave alone the red card.

The sending-off of Pascal Bosschaart came during when every foul by a Sydney FC player provoked a roar of protest from the crowd, while similar gestures by Brisbane Roar players were greeted with applause or silence. Quite a number of tackles by Brisbane Roar players looked as bad if not worse than that by Pascal Bosschaart, but none of them was sent off. After the match, the manager of Sydney FC cynically nominated the referee, Chris Beath, as the best player, a determining factor in making sure that Brisbane Roar won, having bent to the pressure of the crowd, a convenient scapegoat for the tactical weaknesses of the visiting side.

Without Pascal Bosschaart, Sydney FC lost its cohesion, was unable to rearrange its midfield and defensive formations and buckles before the inevitable onslaught led by the stars. The seventy-fourth minute saw a perfectly targeted center from Henrique, transformed into a goal by a simple kick from Matthew Jurman. Ten minutes later, Nicholas Fitzgerald outmaneuvered Sebastian Ryall and scored a second goal with a devastating right-foot strike. Then, with about four minutes to go before full time, Nicholas Fitzgerald combined with Besart Berisha and Kofi Danning, in a series of passes and feints that left Sydney FC’s defense in tatters, scored the third goal. On scoring the third goal, Nicholas Fitzgerald got a yellow card for taking off his shirt in celebration, but then such disciplinary gestures by the referee seemed irrelevant. The crowd thought it was all over, and effectively was. The stadium seethed and trembled, cigar smoke rising like an offering to gods; then the crowd poured back into the city in their thousands, momentarily safe and secure, at least until the next encounter.

Critical Reflection

As observed in the story above, color news story involves using a writing style heavy with descriptive language. Color news story focuses on a place, giving readers a strong sense of what it is like to be at a particular location (Carole, 2009). For the above story, it focuses on a specific football match, which is between Sydney FC and Brisbane Roar FC.

The above story is relatively unstructured, and this is how a color story should be. Color news story begins with a description of a particular meaningful place and ends whenever the author wants. In addition, color features may be unified, not by an inverted structure, but rather by a repetition of verbal elements, such as words sounds, metaphors, or details about people (Helen, 2006). The unifying element, as observed in the above story, is repeated consistently throughout the story in order to create a rhythmic structure that enlarges the meaning with each repetition.

According to Wayne, Janet, and Smith (2009), rarely does a color story focus on the results of the game or even the principal action of the game. “That is likely the purpose of another story by the same reporter or, as preferred by most editors, by a second or even a third reporter” (Wayne, Janet, and Smith, 2009). In short, the idea behind this sort of writing is to permit the reader who did not attend to share the event with the writer and others who were there (Wayne, Janet, and Smith, 2009). Color stories take advantage of certain types of sources of information. Color stories usually have people, your perceptions as an observer, your observations, and a common thread; they are used to relate the mood of crowds at events such as football games, festivals, parties and celebrations, parades, concerts, funerals, and memorial services (Wayne, Janet, and Smith, 2009).

References:

Carole Rich (2009). Writing and Reporting News: A Coaching Method: New York: Cengage Learning.

Helen Sissons (2006). Practical Journalism: How to Write News Story. London: SAGE.

Wayne R. Whitaker, Janet E. Ramsey, Ronald D. Smith. (2009). Media Writing: Print,

Broadcast, and Public Relations. New York: Taylor & Francis.

Appendix:

Below is a list of people interviewed and their contact details:

Quanzheng Lin: mobile: 0452407168 email: [email protected]

Yeping Liu: mobile: 0432455586 email: [email protected]

Wandong Bao: mobile: 0434628341 email: [email protected]