Diogo Jota and the race to clickbait his tragic death

It’s essentially harmless that there’s incessant talk of blows and boosts from publishers trying to eke clicks out of a three-month transfer window. It’s all tish and fipsy. Who gives a f*** apart from a grumpy Mediawatch paid to give a f***?

The bar is gradually getting lower than a snake’s belly but there’s one line that should not be breached: Do not clickbait death. It shouldn’t need saying, should it? And yet it seems that it does.

But this is the one time you shouldn’t omit a name from a headline; this is the one time you should not be counting words in statements.

And so to the Express, who published a barely believable 12 stories in the first hour after the news broke, including:

Sky News interrupted for tragic Liverpool FC breaking news announcement

Is that the story? Quick answer: Is it f***. And if you must write that story…USE HIS NAME, you ghouls.

Diogo Jota dead: Piers Morgan issues emotional one-word statement as Liverpool star dies

It was ‘heart-breaking’. It doesn’t need to be click-baited with the ‘one-word statement’ nonsense.

But one particular story (written by the Showbiz Editor) has really left Mediawatch shaking with anger:

Sky Sports fans fume over ‘bizarre’ Diogo Jota death report after hosts make big change

Genuinely, f*** the f*** off. This is not the time to be scouring social media for people annoyed that Sky Sports News scrambled to get confirmation of a man’s death before they announced it.

‘Sky Sports was in chaos as it held off making the announcement,’ reports the Showbiz Editor. ‘People were seen rushing around in the background before it cut to an ad break, and when the programme returned, the anchors were wearing black.’

That’s not ‘bizarre’ (as penned by Richie Wilson (79 followers on X)); it’s protocol. And maybe the Express could learn something.

Elsewhere, the scramble is on for Google rankings on ‘who is Diogo Jota’s wife?’, with The Sun winning the early battle:

Who is Diogo Jota’s wife Rute Cardoso?

Reel in shock as The Sun know absolutely f*** all about Rute Cardoso: Her age, her profession, her background. Just that she was married to Diogo Jota and had three children. At any other time, we might have laughed at the idea that the name of her third child is ‘unknown’.

Coming up next are GB News, suddenly interested in the death of a foreigner, presumably because he was in a car rather than a boat.

They report that ‘she has developed a keen interest in travel, regularly posting photographs on her Instagram account that capture various destinations and experiences’. Such insight. Really feel like we know her now and definitely haven’t just seen a shameless outlet scramble for rankings.

Then come the Evening Standard, who tell us that ‘little is known about what she does for work’. Then don’t write content headlined ‘Who is Diogo Jota’s wife?’ because a) you don’t know and b) it’s nothing short of grotesque to be targeting SEO keywords when a woman has lost her husband and three children have lost their father.

We thought all that was low until we saw that the Mirror had published ‘First picture of Diogo Jota car wreckage shows devastating aftermath of tragic accident’. And the Express opt for ‘First image of Diogo Jota crash emerges that left bodies unidentifiable’.

Roll up, roll up, to see pictures of a burned-out car in which two men died earlier today.

MAILBOX: RIP Diogo Jota as Liverpool fans joined by rivals in tribute