While you were sleeping or imbibing beverages ahead of UFC 202 last night, a tumultuous Twitter spat broke out between Ewan MacKenna and Oliver Holt, the chief sportswriter with the Mail on Sunday and one of big cahunas on the British sports beat. MacKenna has been one of Ireland's best performers at Rio - asking Mo Farah some tough questions and Twitter-brawling with the likes of Matthew Pinsent but he came up against a steely foe last night who was intent in turning a run-of-the-mill Twitter scrap into a street fight.
It started with a Holt piece on the triumph of sport at Rio but the tension stems from MacKenna's questioning of Mo Farah after the 10,000m final in Rio and a growing social media perception that the British sports hacks are cheerleading for Team GB and abdicating duty. Things got heated though, as a peeved and sensitive Holt went OTT in offering MacKenna plenty of unsolicited advice on RT'ing praise and writing a Twitter bio.
It's proof that British journalists did not appreciate the reaction to MacKenna's tough questioning of Farah last weekend. Twitter scraps never reflect well on either party but surely Holt crossed a line here.
We've done our best to put it all together in one coherent transcript.
Holt finished with a three-tweet combination.
no, Ewan, you attacked me having never met me. Good luck with your attempts at revisionism
— Oliver Holt (@OllieHolt22) August 21, 2016
I thought you were supposed to be the courageous journalist. Stick to your guns and keep accusing me of cheering
— Oliver Holt (@OllieHolt22) August 21, 2016
not different at all. Same. Get on with your own job
— Oliver Holt (@OllieHolt22) August 21, 2016
We score it 10-9 to Holt.
