I've noticed that from time-to-time when watching Setanta they sometimes "screw-up". Instead of selecting the "centre-cut" option from their incoming international feeds for 4:3 display, they sometimes pipe the feed through the channel in its raw "Full-Height Anamorphic" format. I noticed they did this for a few minutes during the beginning of both the 2nd quarter and at half-time during the Fremantle game this past weekend. Unfortunatly after a few minutes they "fixed" this problem.
I honestly wish they would keep it in the Full-Height Anamorphic format. The games themselves are shot in Widescreen, and everyone with a Widescreen TV can simply hit the 16:9 button on their TVs to properly restore the Widescreen image even though Setanta is not a true HD channel. The games look much better in Widescreen even though the resolution is still the same.
I don't understand why North American TV is like this for digital platforms. TV stations (even standard definition) should ALWAYS pipe through their stations in "Full-Height Anamorphic" format. The Cable box itself should be, and is capable of modifying the image for older TVs on-the-fly. This is how it's done in the UK and Australia and for DVDs in general. In other words, if people want a 4:3 centre-cut image, this is something which s hould be set in the cable box, the feed however should not be cut itself. Yet for some strange reason Digital Standard Definition TV stations here always pipe through a terrible 4:3 centre-cut image even though the raw international feed is a 16:9 Full-Height anamorphic picture. There is no reason for Setanta to do this with digital platforms that use a cable/satellite box.
