PRIVATEVIEW.(Brief Article)(Column)

6 Although it was well over a year after I'd had any close involvement with the Rover business, and although I felt desperately sorry for all the people who'd worked so hard and conscientiously at Ammirati Puris Lintas, I still felt a slight frisson of satisfaction when I heard the account was up for review. It was partly because the pitch would teach at least three other London agencies just how difficult it was as a piece of business. It was also because I knew that whoever won it was on a hiding to nothing. Well, M&C Saatchi won it and they all deserve our sympathy.

For an unexplained reason, probably because it's inexplicable, a Rover hurtles around a pinball machine intercut with close-ups of mysterious people looking mysteriously like out-takes from the Rover "Cool Britannia" commercials. Those at least had relevance and a point. Would you say a voiceover intoning "safe, responsive, in …