Lineker defends BBC coverage of scenes

THE BBC has been widely criticised for not cutting away sooner after Christian Eriksen’s collapse, but an apologetic Gary Lineker insisted it was beyond the corporation’s control.

Ian Wright, a BBC pundit, rounded on his bosses for continuing to broadcast the distressing scenes of Eriksen being given life-saving CPR on the pitch during the game between Denmark and Finland in Copenhagen.

The BBC carried on showing coverage from the Parken Stadium for almost 15 minutes from the moment Eriksen fell to the ground before returning to Lineker in the studio.

Wright, who wasn’t working on the match, tweeted: ‘CUT TO THE STUDIO FFS !!!! ’

The BBC could have gone back to Lineker and his studio guests at any point.

Yet Lineker insisted the host broadcaster was solely to blame. In a statement, he said: ‘Everyone at the BBC is hoping that Christian makes a full recovery, of course, and we apologise to anyone who was upset by the images broadcast. The stadium coverage is controlled by UEFA as the host broadcaster and, as soon as the match was suspended, we took our coverage off air as quickly as possible.’