A veteran sports commentator has lost his spot on Turkey’s national public broadcaster TRT’s 2022 FIFA World Cup coverage team over an on-air gaffe that mixed up two competing Group G teams, broadcaster officials confirmed this week.
The error unfolded during Monday’s tightly contested Group G match between Iran and New Zealand, which ended in a 2-2 draw between the two sides. In the opening minutes of TRT’s live broadcast, commentator Murat Ekrem Çimen, a 30-year veteran of sports media named by local Turkish outlets, incorrectly attributed Iran’s offensive plays to New Zealand and mislabeled New Zealand’s in-game maneuvers as Iran’s.
In an official statement released late Tuesday, TRT announced that Çimen had been immediately removed from the network’s World Cup commentary delegation based in the United States, and will not take part in any further match coverage for the duration of the tournament. The network added that a full internal investigation into the incident is ongoing.
TRT framed the mistake as a clear violation of the network’s official broadcasting standards, noting that the error was particularly notable given Çimen’s decades of experience in sports journalism. “We apologize to our viewers and the public for this error,” the statement read. “It is unacceptable for TRT that someone with over 30 years of experience in sports broadcasting would make such a mistake.”