The question FNB forgot to ask when they okayed the concept of their TV ad with the little girl who forgets the words of the national anthem is this: how come the rest of people in the FNB Stadium weren’t singing along with her in the first place. That was the same thing Radio 702 host Jenny Cryws-Williams asked on Wednesday when the Springboks didn’t start singing when Ard Matthews found that words didn’t come easy to him at the World Cup squad announcement on Tuesday night.

Imagine if John Smit had started singing along like that ginger lady did in the telly ad? Imagine if Smitty, whose status as a ginger is something not often spoken about (except by Sias du Plessis, the 5FM sports fella and leader of the GAP organisation – Gingers Are People, too), stood up, flicked back the tassle on his World Cup cap, and helped Matthews, his fellow ginga, out. Ad executives would have wet themselves, the YouTube hits would be bigger than Susan Boyle before she tweezed her eyebrows and brushed her hair, and there wouldn’t have been a dry eye anywhere in South Africa.

But they didn’t. And the announcement became more about the singing of the anthem than who was picked and who was left out. Indeed, Brandseye, an online reputation management service (“reputation” is the new catchword for companies once called marketers, PRs and media managers), reported that up and until Wednesday morning Matthews was the second-biggest conversation theme during and after the announcement live on SuperSport on Twitter, facebook and other social platforms. Of the 2 600 mentions in the “online space” (also known as cyberspace, where no one can hear you scream… unless you have messed up singing the national anthem on television) 500 were about Matthews. The reach of the announcement was 3 925 480 people and the advertising equivalent value was, as of Wednesday morning, R760 983.

Apart from Matthews, the online conversation for the evening had various themes, according to Brandseye: the players were the most spoken about, with much of the Twitter feed directed directly at the players who have a presence there and who tend to engage with the public more often than others. Matthews was the second-most popular topic. Smit got 190 mentions, Victor Matfield 163, Bryan Habana 185, Pierre Spies 205 and Butch James was number one with 231, possibly because he giggled during the announcement, which endeared him to users.

Brandseye say 23 percent of mentions were positive “to the point of endorsement and praise”, 64 percent were neutral, and 13 percent negative. Yup, Matthews was unlucky 13, which, he will tell you, sounds about right after what he admitted was the “worst night of his life”.