Hapoel Tel Aviv's coach gets into incident with journalist, apologizes later / News - Basketnews.com

Hapoel's head coach, Danny Franco, pushed TV reporter Noa Poplinger during the timeout multiple times and received stark criticism online for it. Franco later issued an apology and said the event hadn't happened and would not happen again.

Credit: Sport5 Credit Sport5

Hapoel Shlomo Tel Aviv's head coach Danny Franco got into a conflict with a local reporter during Israeli Winner League's game against Bnei Ofek Dist Herzliya.

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During a timeout in the third quarter, Sport5's journalist Noa Poplinger was directing a microphone toward Hapoel's bench for TV viewers to hear what Franco was communicating to his player during the break.

In the middle of the timeout, Franco pushed Poplinger and her microphone away. When she continued standing nearby, Poplinger was pushed again, both by Franco and his assistant Barak Ledrer.

Bewildered by what happened, Poplinger left the area moments later. Franco received criticism for his actions toward Poplinger and issued a public apology later.

"I was wrong, period. I apologize. There are no excuses, and there is not a single person who knows me who would say that the timeout incident characterizes me. Never happened before and won't happen again," Franco wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Contrary to the usual practice in Europe, boom microphones are not used in the Israeli Winner League. Instead, a representative from the broadcaster is usually nearby the team's bench, who holds the regular microphone as the timeout progresses.

Poplinger is one of the prominent names in Israeli sports media. She usually works on the sidelines in both basketball and football games, conducting interviews with players and coaches both during and after matches. She also works for Sport5 as a daily reporter.

Poplinger hasn't publicly commented about the incident as of the time of writing.

Franco's incident with Noa Poplinger:

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