This was not Match of the Day. By axing the opening credits, the BBC made that much clear from the outset. Instead a voiceover provided a pithy apology and a budget graphic popped up saying Premier League highlights.
Then there were goals, a save or two, a VAR check here and there. And basically nothing else for 20 bizarre minutes soundtacked by crowd noise and nothing else.
We had known for more than 24 hours that it would be a highlights package like no other. From no presenter to no pundits. Then to no commentators and key production staff. Let's hope the last one left in Media City’s football department turned the lights off.
But this was still a completely farcical viewing experience. An utter nonsense. And really, once you can momentarily park the dangerous stifling of free speech to view what was on the screen, borderline amusing.
The BBC, remember, pay hundreds of millions of pounds to have the right to show Premier League highlights. Nevermind the fact better edited clips with commentary were available legally on YouTube several hours earlier.
As the layers quickly unpeeled following Friday’s baffling decision to sideline Lineker for having the temerity to criticise the language of political policy, all that was left was the programme’s core: 15 goals from six different games.
It was not the most eventful day in Premier League history, even if it was bookended by Liverpool delivering another stinker at Bournemouth and Man City using their experience to grind out three points away to Crystal Palace as they pursue leaders Arsenal.
Yet it was still quite something to behold when even the iconic theme tune was culled and instead of a camera zooming in on Lineker, prepped to deliver an acerbic intro to set the scene before delivering the action and analysis, there was simply action from Bournemouth’s win in the lunchtime kick-off.
It was not even close to a stripped down version similar to those 30-minute highlights packages that are created by the Premier League’s own in-house media and replayed to fill schedules on Sky and BT during the week.
One game rolled into another, interspersed with those cheap looking graphics that anyone with a laptop and internet connection could whisk up in a couple of minutes.
They did at least offer us a quick sight of the table at the end to some non-descript synth music.
And like that it was over. Instead of Lineker delivering a closing one-liner to sum up the day’s highlight with a wry smile and a nod, BBC 1’s schedule swiftly moved on to Sully: Miracle on the Hudson, a film about a plane landing on the river.
This is a story with some twists to come and, surely, severe repercussions for figures high above the broadcaster’s sports department.
Yet those who lost out were the viewers who still faithfully tune in on a Saturday to get their fix despite all the goals being available elsewhere hours earlier. And the direction of blame for that unquestionably rests with weak figures at the top of the BBC who buckled under Tory pressure.
Lineker, Ian Wright, Alan Shearer and the rest will be back on our screens sooner rather than later – the broadcaster’s chief decision makers must find a spine in the coming days to ensure it is not on another channel.
