Lazy Journalism is Lazy

Over at We Ain't Got No History, Graham complained about the Guardian's lack of journalistic integrity when reporting (i.e. using unattributed reports that came from Portuguese media sources) on Andre Villa Boas. Similarly, I'm also going to complain about the Press Association's lazy journalism reporting on quotes made by Sandro Rosell yesterday about the transfer of Cesc Fabregas.

The headline of the Press Association's story is that Cesc Fabregas is doing all he can to join Barcelona, with that quote being attributed to Sandro Rosell. The story went on to say that

Rosell, Barcelona's president, claimed the Catalan club would not pay over the odds for the midfielder. "He is doing everything he can to come," he said on Catalan television on Monday night.

"Guardiola knows the values of players and Cesc's is less than €40m (£35.4m). Barcelona will offer less and if they [Arsenal] don't accept, then he won't come. Pep knows the club is not well-off in terms of money."

Rosell did talk with Catalan TV last night, but, according to the excellent Arseblog, he said something a little different:

“I don’t know if Cesc will sign or not. We’ll offer less than €40m and if Arsenal don’t agee, then Cesc will not come. Have no doubt, he has a great desire to come here. We have €45m for signings, plus money from sales. There is no more money”

Hmm. Saying "he has a great desire to come here" is very different from "he is doing everything he can to come".

Well, perhaps the PA were just rewording what Google Translate gave them from the original source

Or not:

"I do not know whether or not to sign Cesc. From what I have no doubt is that he is eager to come to Barca. We will offer less than 40 million euros and if Arsenal does not stop, will not come as Cesc." In addition, the president has made clear that the club's budget is limited to sign: "We have to sign over 45 million net sales during the next 5 years. There is no more money."

Nowhere in Arseblog's translation, or the Google translation was anything ever said about Cesc Fabregas "doing all he can" to join Barcelona. So unless there's some Spanish that Google Translate and Arseblog missed (which I doubt, seeing as he speaks the language), the Press Association made up, or over exaggerated what Rosell said in order to make it sound like Cesc Fabregas is trying to engineer a move away from Arsenal (which he said he wouldn't, media). Because of this misleading translation, many media sites are falsely reporting that Fabregas is trying to do all he can to leave Arsenal. Mistranslations by the media have happened too may times, and it is time for someone to take responsibility, otherwise people will stop believing the newspapers. Isn't that what they're worried about?

And seriously, how hard is it to do your job and instead of being Scott Templeton, report what was actually said.

 

P.S.: €40m? Really? Ok, then, he won't go, Sandro. But just to annoy you, can we offer £35m for Lionel Messi? I reckon he's got more wear and tear over the last two years. He's basically damaged goods now. You're lucky to get that much.