The lead headline on Tuesday, Sept. 2 sport's front reads, "Rivalry shows teams ability," with the subhead reading, "In spite of loss, game was night of firsts for Illini."
The headline is not specific and will not draw the reader into the story. I think the subhead is better than the headline, but I think both could use work. By saying words like "team" and "Illini," the reader would have no idea what the story was about if it were not for the photo directly to the right of the headline. The space given for the headline would be difficult to work with, since it has large text in two columns to work with. I think switching the ideas of the headline and subhead may have worked better.
For the headline, I would have tried something like, "Not all lost in football's defeat," and changed the subhead to refer to the rivalry and more opportunities with something like, "Mizzou match leaves team ready for season"
Reworking headlines with certain key words can make a big difference to the reader and the writer because the writer's story may have a chance of being read from start to finish.
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4 comments:
It's really tough to know how to play a story when the first chance comes three days after the event. Everybody knows the outcome of the game, but what feature angle should be highlighted? No formula for that.
I totally agree with you Sue. That headline made little to no sense. With a second day story, or in this case a fourth day story, the headline should highlight a featury component of the story and reflect that in the headline.
As for your suggested subhead, I would change the word match to game or contest because the word match and game are not interchangable in some sports.
I found a typo last time...
I didn't like this headline because it's misleading. That headline has a spirited tone and if read alone could give the impression that the Illini won the game. They lost, simple as that. While they did have burst of greatness during the game, they didn't show enough ability to pull off a victory. If anything, I thought that the game revealed that the team still has some work to do.
I like you headline. It puts the fact that the Illini lost right out there, but still keeps an optimistic tone. I think this is a good way to put it, especially in the hometown of the team. You can't just knock the home team, but you shouldn't convey a false sense of success, either.
(I realize this post is late. I got logged off in class before I had a chance to post it. Sorry!)
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