OVER the past few days, we have been treated to some golden moments at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

From Andy Murray giving us heart attacks, twice, to Max Whitlock bringing us heartache, we've had it all. There's just been one glaring problem. The coverage.

Before you shake a fist at your license fee, the BBC, Eurosport and other broadcasters aren't responsible for the broadcasting. no, they are solely responsible for their commentating (which has been, as ever, phenomenal).

Broadcasting is instead down to the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

In 2001, the IOC created Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) the body that films all the competitions at the Olympic Games and makes these images, edited in real-time and enhanced with graphics and animations, to the world's broadcasters (this is known as the “world feed”).

During the Olympic Games, thousands of people work for OBS. They come from all over the world, to ensure maximum “neutrality” in the way the competitions are recorded. Should be plain sailing then, right? No.

The lost Doctor Who episodes from the 1960s were easier to find than Nadal vs Djokovic the other day, and I have every subscription.

Not only can high-profile events be a pain to find, but when you do manage to blindly stumble across them, the OBS flicks back and forth between events.

When "I don't want to watch the Chinese!" rang out through my kitchen on Monday, I thought a Reform MP had broken in.

However, Max Whitlock was on the pommel horse and my mum was seething at the coverage itself. Instead of watching him compete, we were treated to some Chinese athletes standing around as the BBC commentators described Max's motions. 

Some things are not made for the radio, 'pommel-horsing' is certainly one of them:

"And here is Max with the single-leg swing and scissor circle and flair." Ah yes, I know it well.

Twitter thought the same. And it happened again on Wednesday.

Great Britain's Kieran Reilly secured BMX freestyle silver in a dramatic Olympic final in Paris. But as he was upside down in the air on two wheels, the footage changed again to some Chinese coaches in another stadium.

The Paris Olympics has been a strange one thus far. Not only did the opening ceremony raise eyebrows but the general organisation has been, questionable.

Scoreboards during the tennis have been delayed and the coverage itself has been confusing as you sometimes cannot tell which point is live or a replay.

Not only that, but the cameramen focus on a close-up of the player instead of the whole court whilst a point is underway. Top-tier pull-your-hair-out stuff.

The triathlon looked in doubt at one stage because the Seine is a cesspit of disease. Huge congratulations to Alex Yee, but get to your GP as soon as possible, pal.

From malfunctions to red buttons, it's getting very tiresome. I hit about a billion combinations on the remote yesterday before landing on Clare Balding whispering sweet nothings. It must’ve been one of those celebratory Easter eggs you used to find on DVDs.

Of course, some events are going to overlap and not everything is going to be perfect all the time. That is standard, but the OBS and Olympic committee in general really ought to do better and give us at least a slither of consistency.

The 100m final is arguably the crème de la crème of the Olympics, an event that history remembers above all else, regardless of year. But I'm really not confident.

In a week, don’t be surprised if the timer breaks and there’s a ref at the end going “revenez les gars (back you go lads)”.